Explore iconic NBA records that experts believe will never be broken, from Wilt Chamberlain's 100-point game to LeBron's scoring record and Curry's 3-point dominance.
Drew Coleman
The NBA’s rich history is filled with remarkable achievements. While many records have fallen over time, some milestones are so extraordinary that they are widely considered “unbreakable” due to the unique circumstances or sheer dominance involved. Below is a curated list of the most iconic NBA records that still stand today, along with context on when they were set, who holds them, and why experts believe these marks will likely stand forever.
On March 2, 1962, Wilt Chamberlain scored 100 points in a single NBA game – a feat no other player has ever come close to matching. Playing for the Philadelphia Warriors against the New York Knicks, Chamberlain sank 36 field goals and 28 free throws, leading his team to a 169–147 win. The next-highest single-game scoring effort is Kobe Bryant’s 81 points in 2006, which still fell far short of Wilt’s century mark. This game became one of the most legendary moments in sports, immortalized by the famous photo of Chamberlain holding a “100” sign.
Even Kobe Bryant, known for his scoring prowess, acknowledged how untouchable Chamberlain’s record is. After his 81-point game, Bryant said he wasn’t even thinking about 100 because “that’s unthinkable. It was done once – by Wilt, and I’m not Wilt.”
Chamberlain’s 100-point explosion has stood for over 60 years, and many analysts believe we may reach the 100th anniversary of that game without anyone breaking it. In today’s game – with teams emphasizing ball movement and defense more than feeding one player – it’s nearly impossible to imagine a single player scoring 100 in 48 minutes. This singular performance remains the NBA’s ultimate individual scoring record, one that truly may never be broken.
Legendary center Bill Russell won 11 NBA championships as a player with the Boston Celtics, a record that has become virtually untouchable. Russell’s titles came in just a 13-year span (1957–1969), including an astonishing run of 8 consecutive championships from 1959 to 1966. No other NBA player has more than 6 championship rings (Michael Jordan has 6, for example), highlighting how far beyond reach Russell’s mark is. His era featured a smaller league and a dominant Celtics dynasty, but even so, 11 titles by one player is a towering achievement in any era.
Modern experts often cite Russell’s 11 rings as an unbreakable record due to changes in the league’s competitive balance and player movement. In today’s NBA, talent is more evenly spread across teams and players frequently change teams in free agency, making long dynastic runs harder to sustain. “Winning as many championships as Russell did is almost impossible in today’s NBA,” one analysis notes, pointing out that even modern dynasties like the Warriors have come nowhere near 11. Indeed, no team or player has dominated the league to that extent since the 1960s. Russell’s championship count stands as a testament to his leadership and the Celtics’ dynasty – a record that league historians confidently deem unmatchable in the foreseeable future.
The Los Angeles Lakers’ 33-game winning streak in the 1971–72 season remains the longest winning streak in NBA history, and it is widely viewed as a record that will likely never be broken. That Lakers squad, led by Wilt Chamberlain, Jerry West, and Gail Goodrich, won 33 consecutive games from November 1971 to January 1972 – a run of dominance that has stood for over five decades. For context, the next-longest NBA win streak is 27 games (achieved by the 2012–13 Miami Heat), still six short of L.A.’s mark. Even that Heat team, stacked with superstars in their prime, fell well shy of 33 straight wins, underscoring how incredible the Lakers’ streak was.
Analysts and former players often describe the 33-game streak as virtually unbreakable because everything has to align perfectly for such a run. “Too many things have to go right, for too long, against too many teams,” one writer noted about the improbability of any team winning 34 in a row. Over a streak that long, injuries, schedule fatigue, and simply off-nights make it extraordinarily hard to keep winning. In 1971–72 there were fewer teams and a bit less parity, yet it still took a near-perfect storm for the Lakers to achieve 33 straight victories. In today’s era of parity and careful load management, it’s hard to imagine any team approaching this streak. The Lakers’ feat stands not only as an NBA record but one of the most impressive sustained runs in all of professional sports – a record very likely to stand the test of time.
In the 1961–62 season, Wilt Chamberlain accomplished a season-long scoring average that defies belief: 50.4 points per game. Over 80 games that year, Chamberlain poured in 4,029 points, setting the NBA record for highest scoring average in a season. No other player in league history has even come close – the next-highest is Michael Jordan’s 37.1 PPG in 1986–87, and beyond Jordan, no one else has averaged even 35+ for a season. Chamberlain’s 1961–62 campaign also saw him average 48.5 minutes per game, meaning he effectively played every minute of every game (thanks to overtime, he exceeded the normal 48). He was never substituted out that entire season except for one game where he was ejected in the fourth quarter. These eye-popping numbers are the product of a different era and Chamberlain’s otherworldly stamina and scoring ability. NBA historians routinely call this season “etched in statistical concrete, never to be duplicated.”
Chamberlain’s scoring average is so far beyond modern norms that it’s hard to fathom a player even attempting that many shots today – he took about 39.5 field goal attempts per game that year, whereas today’s scoring leaders typically take around 20–25 shots. The game has also changed to emphasize efficiency, 3-point shooting, and resting players, making it virtually impossible for someone to play every minute and carry such a scoring load for an entire season. As one account put it, Chamberlain’s 50.4 PPG season is essentially a record “written in statistical concrete, never to be duplicated.”
It stands as a testament to an era of breakneck pace – and to Wilt’s unparalleled dominance – that we will likely never see again.
John Stockton amassed 15,806 assists over his NBA career with the Utah Jazz, by far the most in league history. Stockton was the NBA’s assist leader for nine consecutive seasons (1987–1996) and finished his career more than 3,000 assists ahead of the next closest player. For perspective, the active assist leader Chris Paul (as of 2025) has just over 12,000 assists and is nearing age 40 – nowhere near Stockton’s mark. In fact, Stockton also holds the second-most unbreakable record in steals (3,265 career steals), which likewise puts him about 600 ahead of the next best (Jason Kidd). Stockton achieved these numbers by playing 19 seasons at a high level, rarely missing games, and serving as the engine of a pass-first offense under coach Jerry Sloan.
It is widely agreed that Stockton’s assist record is virtually untouchable. Even at the height of his career, Chris Paul – one of the greatest playmakers of the modern era – would need five more full seasons of 82 games averaging 9+ assists just to catch Stockton, a scenario that is essentially impossible at Paul’s age. As one ESPN writer flatly stated, “Nobody is going to break John Stockton’s assist record… Quite possibly, never. As in, n-e-v-e-r.”
The style of play has shifted as well; today’s point guards score more and offenses are less funnelled through one playmaker, so racking up assists in bulk has become harder. Stockton’s combination of remarkable longevity, durability, and consistent playmaking excellence set a record that looks “as unattainable as Wilt Chamberlain’s 100-point game,” according to observers. It’s a career record that seems safely out of reach for future generations.
In February 2023, LeBron James became the NBA’s all-time leading scorer, breaking Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s longstanding record of 38,387 regular-season points. Now in his 20th season, LeBron has pushed the record even further – by late 2024 he had surpassed 41,000 career points(and if you include postseason scoring, he has totaled over 50,000 points, the first player ever to do so). This scoring record, once thought untouchable, was held by Kareem for nearly 39 years. Magic Johnson captured the sentiment at the time by telling LeBron, “I never thought that Kareem’s scoring record would be broken by anybody.” LeBron’s achievement, built on unrivaled longevity and consistency (he has averaged 25+ points for two decades), has now created a new gold standard that may itself last for generations.
Why is LeBron’s record viewed as unbreakable? Consider that to challenge his eventual total, a future player would likely need to average around 25–30 points per game for close to 20 seasons – and stay remarkably healthy throughout, something no one besides LeBron has done. James entered the NBA at age 18 and has maintained elite production into his late 30s, a combination of longevity and peak performance that is unprecedented. Even as scoring averages have risen league-wide, players often miss games for rest or injuries, making it extremely hard to accumulate the sheer volume of points LeBron has. Upon breaking the record, LeBron himself called the moment “humbling” and noted how it was a “once-in-a-generation” achievement.
Now that he’s the scoring king, James has set a bar that many believe will stand perhaps forever – much as Kareem’s did, only with LeBron pushing it to new heights that might be beyond any future player’s reach.
The NBA’s 3-point revolution has a clear leader: Stephen Curry, who has made more 3-pointers than anyone in history. In fact, Curry recently became the first player ever to hit 4,000 career three-pointers, shattering the previous records. For comparison, the next-closest player (as of 2025) is James Harden, who has just over 3,100 and is nearing the end of his career. Curry not only set the single-season record for threes (402 in 2015–16) but has consistently led the league in made 3’s, accumulating a lead that grows each year. By the time he’s done, Curry will have pushed the boundaries of 3-point shooting to a place no one else has approached.
Given the gap he has opened, Curry’s career 3-point record is widely seen as unbreakable for the foreseeable future. He has essentially defined the modern 3-point shot and benefitted from the era’s embrace of it – yet even newer generations of volume shooters will find it hard to catch him. As ESPN noted, only one other player in history (Harden) has even made 3,000 threes, and Harden is nearly 900 behind Curry and slowing down. “Catching Curry? Probably impossible,” one analyst flatly stated.
Curry’s combination of elite accuracy, volume, and longevity (he has been making ~250–300 threes a year for over a decade) means that every additional season he plays puts the record further out of reach. Future stars would not only need Curry’s shooting talent but also his durability and freedom to shoot at high volume for many years. That perfect storm is unlikely to repeat. Thus, Curry’s all-time 3-point mark – a product of a revolutionary player in the perfect era – stands as an extremely safe record that may never be broken.
A.C. Green earned the nickname “Iron Man” by playing in 1,192 consecutive games from 1986 to 2001, the longest streak of consecutive games in NBA history. In 15+ seasons across four different teams, Green simply never missed a game (aside from a few at the very start of his career). To put this in perspective, Green played all 82 games in eleven different seasons. The second-longest streak in NBA history (held by Randy Smith) is 906 games, meaning Green topped it by nearly 300 games. In today’s NBA, where players are routinely rested for minor injuries or maintenance, even playing 82 games in back-to-back seasons is becoming rare, let alone doing it every year for well over a decade.
Green’s ironman record is regarded as one of those feats that will likely never be approached, especially in the modern era of load management. As one write-up noted, this streak showcases Green’s incredible durability and consistency, and it remains unchallenged “even in today’s era of advanced player management.”
Today’s teams prioritize keeping players fresh for the playoffs, and even the most durable stars often take occasional games off. Green, by contrast, was famous for playing through injuries and illnesses that might sideline others – he even played shortly after undergoing dental surgery and famously adhered to a strict lifestyle that kept him in peak shape. The league has also lengthened the season schedule slightly to reduce back-to-backs, meaning fewer opportunities to even play 82 games in a row. All these factors make it exceedingly unlikely that anyone will break Green’s 1,192-game streak. It’s an ironman record that, much like Cal Ripken Jr.’s in baseball, looks destined to stand permanently as a testament to one man’s extraordinary endurance and commitment.
Each of these records has attained almost mythical status among fans and analysts. They are not just numbers, but symbols of the exceptional players and circumstances that produced them. As decades pass, these milestones continue to inspire awe and debate, reminding us of what’s possible when greatness meets opportunity. While it’s often said that “no record is truly unbreakable,” the records above come as close as it gets – and if they are ever broken, it would require nothing short of basketball history repeating itself in the most spectacular fashion.
Sources: Historical NBA statistics and records from ESPN, NBA.com, and reputable sports media
