Denver's rush from a reprehensible record - Flashback: the 1997-98 Nuggets

Basketball Digest, Jan, 2003 by Chuck O'Donnell

THE DENVER NUGGETS HAD long cemented their place as the league laughingstock as they began to file into the locker room to play the Sacramento Kings on January 23, 1998. "Send the Nuggets back to McDonald's," read one sign at McNichols Arena that season.

"Playing Denver is like playing a high school team," the Chicago Bulls' Dennis Rodman laughed. "This is the worst team in the history of basketball."

"I'd be dead by now if I lost 22 in a row," Detroit Pistons coach Doug Collins said after the Pistons hung a 20-point loss on the Nuggets, the previous night.

One more loss made it 23 in a row, and it was getting to the point where the league was probably thinking about giving the Nuggets all the ping-pong balls in the draft lottery out of sympathy. But alas, they had a special reason to beat the Los Angeles Clippers and avoid Loss No. 24: History. One more loss and the Nuggets would be the sole owners of the longest losing streak during the course of one season in NBA history, having already equaled the Vancouver Grizzlies expansion-season mark. And another loss would tie the Cadavers, err, Cavaliers' record for the longest losing streak overall, a 24-game slide that spanned the 1981-82 and 1982-83 seasons.

The Nuggets deserved a break. The team had been run like an estate sale for years: Dikembe Mutombo had been allowed to leave via free agency years earlier, and Eddie Johnson, Mark Jackson, Vincent Askew, Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf, Dale Ellis, Harold Ellis and Tom Hammonds came and went. When general manager Allan Bristow traded Antonio McDyess to the Phoenix Suns for draft choices in October 1997, the only question left was whether this team had what it took to challenge the league record for fewest wins in a season (nine).

The Nuggets were well on their way. Thanks to injuries to Bryant Stith and Eric Williams, coach Bill Hanzlik had five first-year players, a CBA recruit, two or three players of marginal NBA talent--the Priest Lauderdales of the world--and the serviceable LaPhonso Ellis to work with.

Everyone knew the Nuggets would be bad, and Hanzlik admitted as much before the season When he "optimistically" predicted, "We won't be dead last" But even Hanzlik couldn't have foreseen this.

The losing streak started on December 9, 1997 with a 92-83 loss at Detroit. Frustration started to set in at Loss No. 8, when the Nuggets scored just seven points in the fourth quarter and lost to the Golden State Warriors. Afterward, Hanzlik muttered, "Find some ground and bury me."

Loss No. 12 was the closest thing to Win No. 1. The Houston Rockets needed a three-pointer by Brent Price with 3.4 seconds remaining to send the game into overtime. Eventually, Houston won by a point.

In Loss No. 14, the Dallas Mavericks snapped a 15-flame losing streak by spanking the Nuggets by 18 points. Loss No. 15 established a new Denver record for longest losing streak. The Nuggets led 50-48 at halftime, failed to hold a halftime lead for the ninth straight time, and dropped to 0-18 on the road. "We didn't want to be the one that lost to them, to have to go home and hear about it on ESPN," said San Antonio Spurs forward Monty Williams.

In Loss No. 21, the Grizzlies snapped a 13 game-losing streak. And Loss No. 23 was perhaps the toughest to swallow. McDyess scored 24 points against his former teammates, including two dunks in the final minute. "I have sympathy for them, but we didn't want to be the ones they beat," McDyess said.

But faced with the prospect of setting the mark for the longest single-season losing streak in one season ever, the Nuggets did some soul searching in a pregame meeting. They came out to the floor with determination. And for the first time in a month and a half, they won a game, beating the Clippers, 99-81. The immortal Anthony Goldwire scored 20 points in the win.

Eventually, the Nuggets put together a "hot" streak at the end of the season and finished 11-71--the second-worst record ever. Hanzlik and Bristow lost their jobs and team was ripped apart again.

But five years ago this month, as the Nuggets trotted back to the locker room after snapping their 23-game slide, they couldn't hide the smiles on their faces.

"I wish it was the NBA championship," point guard Bobby Jackson said. "It felt good not to go down in the record books as the worst team."