Yahoo News Bucks owner has sights set on surpassing Michael Jordan’s 72-win Bulls team
The Milwaukee Bucks are in a great position several months into the 2019-20 season.
Fresh off their ninth straight win, a 151-131 triumph against the Washington Wizards on Tuesday, the Bucks hold a commanding lead in the Eastern Conference with a 41-6 record, eight full games ahead of the rest of the pack.
With that historic start under his belt, Milwaukee co-owner Marc Lasry couldn’t help but bring it up with Michael Jordan while the two teams were in Paris last week. He didn’t, however, take Jordan’s advice.
“When I was in Paris, I was talking to Michael about this and I said, ‘Well, what do you think? I think we've got a real shot at doing what you guys have done [win 70 games]. This is a really unique team,’” Lasry said, via ESPN.
“And he goes, ‘Look, my advice to you is don't focus on beating our record, focus on winning a championship.’ And I said, ‘Wow, that's great. Thank you for that. Just so you know we're going to focus on beating your record and winning a championship.’ I think we should do everything, but that's me.”
Now, Jordan’s advice is sound. At the end of the day, every player in the league is playing to win a title. They may hunt down other accolades or accomplishments along the way, but it almost always comes back to winning a championship.
Yet hitting the 70-win mark is something that has captivated NBA fans since Michael Jordan’s 1995-96 Chicago Bulls became the first team to do it, going 72-10. Only the Golden State Warriors have hit the 70-win mark since, finishing the 2015-16 season with a 73-9 record.
Though it won’t mean as much without a ring to back it up, this Bucks team is on pace to become just the third team to win 70 or more games in NBA history.
While he is admittedly biased, Lasry fully believes they have what it takes to get it done, too.
“I was hoping we'd get to 80 [this season] ... I know everybody's happy at 70, but I was going for 80,” Lasry said, via ESPN. “When we ended up losing a couple more games, I was like, ‘Damn.’ But we'll see.
“I'm the wrong person to talk to because I actually think we're really good, we have all these capabilities, and what's actually unique about our team is how much it's a team. If you sort of think about it, everybody looks out for each other and everybody sacrifices for the other player. You don't see that with a lot of NBA teams.”
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