Milwaukee only needed 56 games to sew up a postseason berth.
With Washington's 126-117 loss to Chicago on Sunday, Milwaukee claimed a postseason berth, becoming the fastest team in NBA History to do so.
Milwaukee owns a 48-8 record and has a real chance to join the 70-win club currently occupied by the 2015-2016 Golden State Warriors and the 1995-1996 Chicago Bulls. For those squads, it took 58 games to stow away a playoff spot. Although Milwaukee may not capture Golden State's win total record, their season has been nearly as impressive.
Milwaukee has benefitted from a relatively weak schedule thus far, but that hardly relegates their performance. They are 6.5 games clear of Toronto for 2nd place and have passed plenty of tests along the way. However, the second half of the season will be where cracks could be found and formed in the schedule, as Milwaukee has about as many games against teams currently 2-6 in the playoff standings (nine) as they did before it (ten).
The first week of April will be the Bucks' true test. They'll host the champs on the 1st, and then make their way on an East Coast trip to Toronto, Boston, and Philadelphia. Milwaukee's opponents will average a .526 winning percentage over the second half of the season, but seeding hardly appears to be the most pressing issue for Milwaukee. They rank No. 1 overall defensively this season but only seem to falter when opposing teams are hitting threes at a record rate.
If it wasn't apparent enough that what Milwaukee has been doing this season is historic, now they can lay claim to a bit of history as well.
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