The Washington Wizards are mired in another rebuild, but even by the low expectations set for the club this has been a disappointing start to the season. With their 124-114 loss to the Milwaukee Bucks on Saturday, the Wizards finished the month of November without a win at 0-14.
Washington becomes the 16th team in NBA history to go winless for an entire month and has now achieved — is that the right word in this scenario? — the feat in consecutive seasons. Last season, during the middle of a franchise-record 16-game losing streak, they went 0-12 in February.
“The stuff that we’re going through really tests you mentally and and physically and emotionally and you have to keep reminding yourself that the really good players and the great ones in this league, and even in life, like, don’t run away from hard times,” Wizards forward Corey Kispert said earlier this week. “Hard times like this that we’re in is what develops strong character and helps you move forward.”
Though the season has not even reached the quarter-mark, this Wizards team is already entering historically bad territory.
They are 2-16, which has them in last place, and their .111 winning percentage translates to nine victories over the course of the season. In NBA history, the 1973 Philadelphia 76ers are the only team to win fewer than 10 games in an 82-game season. In terms of winning percentage, only those Sixers (.110) and the 2012 Charlotte Bobcats (.106) have finished a season with worse marks.
While Saturday’s contest was more competitive than the 10-point margin would suggest, it was the 13th time during this losing streak that the Wizards have lost by double digits. For the season, their net rating is minus-14.1 — not only the worst in the league, but one of the worst ever.
Team efficiency data on the NBA’s stats website goes back to the 1996-97 season, and during that span the only team to record a worse net rating over the course of a season was the 2012 Bobcats, who went 7-59 with a minus-15.0 net rating in the lockout-shortened campaign.
The bad news for the Wizards is the road is not about to get any easier. They have the league-leading Cleveland Cavaliers, followed by the Dallas Mavericks and Denver Nuggets up next on the docket. Barring a major upset, the losing streak will soon reach 17 games, which would be the longest in franchise history.
