← NBA seasons

1975-76 NBA season

18 teams · 33 weeks · through 1976-06-06 · Elo from the project workbook

Boston Celtics won the title. The season's highest rating belonged to Golden State Warriors, at 1594.

Jump to any season1946-472026-27

The race

Elo rating by week. Higher is stronger; 1500 is average.

How this is measured

Elo moves after every game by how surprising the result was and by how big the margin was, damped so a blowout by a heavy favourite counts for less than the same blowout by an underdog. One pool per season, so the ratings are comparable across the whole league but not across eras.

Week 0 is the preseason seed, carried over from the previous season and adjusted by hand for the roster as it stands. It is an input to the season, not a result of it.

full season
WarriorsCelticsBulletsCavaliers18 of 18 shown · tap or drag any point for that week · tap a line to lock it

Tap or drag on the chart: the nearest team's rating that week.

The table

Where every team stood, scrubbed to the week above.

How this is measured

Three records, because they are three different things. Regular season is the 82-game year and is what the seeding comes from. Playoffs is the postseason run, blank for a team that did not make it, which is not the same as 0-0. Total is the two added together. The Elo column keeps moving through the postseason, so a team can climb after its regular season has finished.

1
59-23 +7-6 · Pacific · seed 1
1594
+23 yr
2
54-28 +12-6 · Atlantic · seed 1
1558
-71 yr
3
48-34 +3-4 · Central · seed 3
1557
-64 yr
4
49-33 +6-7 · Central · seed 2
1554
+106 yr
5
42-40 +10-9 · Pacific · seed 3
1519
+112 yr
6
46-36 +4-5 · Atlantic · seed 5
1506
-33 yr
7
43-39 +2-4 · Pacific · seed 2
1500
+23 yr
8
40-42 · Central
1494
+2 yr
9
46-36 +1-2 · Atlantic · seed 4
1493
+92 yr
10
38-44 · Atlantic
1474
+4 yr
11
36-46 +4-5 · Midwest · seed 5
1469
+8 yr
12
40-42 · Pacific
1468
+68 yr
Show all 18 teams
13
37-45 · Pacific
1464
-14 yr
14
38-44 +1-2 · Midwest · seed 4
1462
-49 yr
15
38-44 · Central
1459
+135 yr
16
31-51 · Midwest
1438
-43 yr
17
24-58 · Midwest
1413
-135 yr
18
29-53 · Central
1370
-31 yr

The postseason

Every series, round by round, with the seeds that met.

How this is measured

Rounds run left to right in the order they were played. The field, the number of rounds and the series length have all changed repeatedly, so the shape here is whatever that season actually had rather than a modern bracket imposed on it. From 2020 the play-in sits below the bracket: those games decided who entered, so a team beaten there did not have a playoff run.

Celtics won the 1976 title.

The honours

Who won what, and who was picked.

How this is measured

Every other section on this page is a club. These are the people: the individual awards, the All-NBA teams and the All-Star selections, all as the workbook records them. A player’s All-Star entry carries which appearance it was for them, so a seventh selection reads differently from a first.

Awards

All-NBA

1st Team All NBA
2nd Team All NBA

All-Star game

The Spectrum, Philadelphia · MVP Dave Bing

Dave BingMVPBullets · #7
Artis GilmoreColonels · #5
Billy KnightPacers · #1
Billy PaultzSpurs · #4
Brian TaylorNets · #2
Don BusePacers · #1
George GervinSpurs · #3
James SilasSpurs · #2
Show all 43 selections
Julius ErvingNets · #5
Larry KenonSpurs · #3
Marvin BarnesSpirits · #2
Maurice LucasColonels · #1
Ron BooneSpirits · #4
Bobby JonesNuggets · #1
Byron BeckNuggets · #2
Chuck WilliamsNuggets · #2
Dan IsselNuggets · #6
David ThompsonNuggets · #1
Ralph SimpsonNuggets · #5
Roger BrownNuggets · #5
Bob McAdooBraves · #3
Dave CowensCeltics · #5
Doug Collins76ers · #1
Elvin HayesBullets · #8
George McGinnis76ers · #4
Jo Jo WhiteCeltics · #6
John DrewHawks · #1
John HavlicekCeltics · #11
Randy SmithBraves · #1
Rudy TomjanovichRockets · #3
Walt FrazierKnicks · #7
Alvan AdamsSuns · #1
Bob DandridgeBucks · #3
Brian WintersBucks · #1
Curtis RowePistons · #1
Jamaal WilkesWarriors · #1
Kareem Abdul-JabbarLakers · #7
Norm Van LierBulls · #2
Phil SmithWarriors · #1
Rick BarryWarriors · #10
Scott WedmanKings · #1
Tiny ArchibaldKings · #3

The best games

The 20 highest-rated games of the season, best first.

How this is measured

Game Score is a composite rating of how good a game was to watch, built from how close it finished, how much the result went against the odds, how far the ratings moved, what was at stake and how highly rated both sides were. It is roughly zero-centred, so an average game sits near zero and anything past two is rare. It is the same metric the all-time and by-decade boards use, so a game keeps the same score wherever it appears.

1
14 May 76 · Conf. Finals
105-104
1.76
2
16 May 76 · Conf. Finals
94-86
1.71
3
6 Jun 76 · NBA Finals
87-80
1.63
4
4 Jun 76 · NBA Finals
128-1263OT
1.61
5
18 May 76 · Conf. Finals
94-87
1.53
6
9 May 76 · Conf. Finals
133-1292OT
1.51
7
29 Apr 76 · Semifinals
87-85
1.51
8
2 Jun 76 · NBA Finals
109-107
1.48
9
30 Apr 76 · Semifinals
118-116OT
1.46
10
2 May 76 · Semifinals
104-100
1.45
Show all 20 games
11
26 Apr 76 · Semifinals
102-98OT
1.44
12
5 May 76 · Conf. Finals
108-101
1.27
13
30 May 76 · NBA Finals
105-98
1.26
14
16 May 76 · Conf. Finals
99-94
1.26
15
28 Apr 76 · Semifinals
124-122
1.16
16
18 Apr 76 · Quarterfinals
124-123OT
1.15
17
130-124OT
1.10
19
11 May 76 · Conf. Finals
83-78
1.10
20
22 Apr 76 · Semifinals
92-91
1.09

Sources

Weekly Elo ratings and records are maintained in the project's NBA workbook and refreshed when it is updated. Season results and honours come from the same workbook. Basketball-Reference, 1975-76.