Wisconsin's 10 Greatest Teams
Honorable Mention to the University of Wisconsin Badgers. Their football team has won 14 Big Ten Championships, most recently in 2012. They have won 15 bowl games, including the Rose Bowl in 1994, 1999 and 2000; and the 2017 Cotton Bowl (for the 2016 season) and the 2017 Orange Bowl (for the 2017 season).
Their basketball team has won the Big Ten 18 times in the regular season, and 3 times in the tournament. They have unofficially won 4 National Championships. They were retroactively awarded them for 1912, 1914 and 1916. They won the NCAA Tournament in 1941, and have also made the Final Four in 2000, 2014 and 2015. Their hockey team has won 13 Big Ten titles, made 12 trips to the Frozen Four, and won 6 National Championships: 1973, 1977, 1981, 1983, 1990 and 2006.
Honorable Mention to the Marquette University Golden Eagles, formerly the Warriors. Their basketball team won the 1977 National Championship, reached the NCAA Final in 1974, reached the Final Four again in 2003, and has won 4 Conference Championships.
Honorable Mention to the 1980-86 Milwaukee Bucks. They won 7 straight Division titles, the 1st in the Midwest Division, the last 6 in the Central Division. They reached the Eastern Conference Finals in 1983, 1984 and 1986, but always seemed to smack into the Philadelphia 76ers (going 1-4 in Playoff series against them over this stretch) or the Boston Celtics (1-2).
In the 32 years since the '86 Bucks made the NBA's "final four," the Bucks have made the Playoffs 16 times, exactly half the time, but have only returned to the Conference Finals once, in 2001.
10. 1978-82 Milwaukee Brewers. They won 93 games to finish 3rd in the American League Eastern Division in 1978, then 95 to finish 2nd in 1979. They fell back in 1980, but, in the strike-forced split season of 1981, they won the AL East in the 2nd half, setting up their 1st Playoff berth, Milwaukee baseball's 1st in 22 years, the 1st-ever AL Division Series against the Yankees, which they lost.
They finally won the Pennant in 1982, but lost the World Series to the St. Louis Cardinals in 7 games. They managed to win 87 games in 1983, but that was it. By the time they put together a couple of strong 3rd-place finishes in the late Eighties (91 wins in 1987, 87 wins and 2 games out in 1988), they were a different team.
9. 1939-47 Sheboygan Red Skins. Who? They played professional basketball in Wisconsin from 1933 to 1952. Note that, unlike the Washington football team, they spell "Red Skins" as 2 words.
They joined the the National Basketball League in 1938. This was a league made up of Midwestern teams, as opposed to the East-based American Basketball League. The Red Skins won the NBL Championship, and thus the closest thing pro basketball then had to a "World Championship," in 1943. They actually made the Finals 5 times in a span of 6 years, but won only the 1 title.
They were invited to join the NBA after the 1949 merger of the BAA and the NBL, and made the Playoffs in the 1949-50 season. But pressure from Knicks president Ned Irish, prejudiced against the teams from smaller cities, forced them out of the league. They hung on for another couple of years, and folded.
8. 1937-44 Oshkosh All-Stars. Who? They played professional basketball in Wisconsin from 1929 to 1949. They were charter members in the NBL in 1937, and won the NBL Championship, and thus the closest thing pro basketball then had to a "World Championship," in 1941 (beating their cross-State rivals, the Red Skins, in the Finals) and 1942. They reached 5 straight Finals, winning the last 2.
They remained a contending team until 1949, losing the NBL Finals to the Indiana-based Anderson Packers. After the season, the NBL merged with the Basketball Association of America, and the combined league was renamed the National Basketball Association. (The NBA considers its beginning to be the 1946 founding of the BAA.)
The NBL produced 5 teams that are still playing in the NBA: The Detroit Gems, who are now the Los Angeles Lakers; the Syracuse Nationals, who are now the Philadelphia 76ers; the Fort Wayne Pistons, who are now the Detroit Pistons; the Buffalo Bisons, who are now the Atlanta Hawks; and the Rochester Royals, who are now the Sacramento Kings. But the All-Stars would not join them: They were invited to, but team owner Lonnie Darling died, and, with his estate in chaos, the team was dissolved.
7. 2009-16 Green Bay Packers. Otherwise known as the Aaron Rodgers Era. Over 8 straight Playoff seasons, the Packers won 5 NFC North Division Championships, and reached 3 NFC Championship Games. But they only won 1 NFC Championship, in the 2010 season, and beat the Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl XLV.
It was an epic event: No team has won more NFL Championships than the Packers (this was their 13th), and no team has won more Super Bowls than the Steelers (6), but this was the 1st time they'd ever faced each other in an NFL Championship Game, under either that name or that of the Super Bowl.
6. 1956-59 Milwaukee Braves. They finished just 1 game behind the Brooklyn Dodgers for the National League Pennant in 1956, then won the 1957 World Series, still the only World Championship a Milwaukee baseball team has ever won. They won another Pennant in 1958, and finished in a tie for the 1959 Pennant, losing a Playoff to the Dodgers, by then in Los Angeles. They had another close call in 1964, then moved to Atlanta after the 1965 season.
5. 1969-74 Milwaukee Bucks. After a rough 1st season allowed them to draft Lew Alcindor, later to change his name to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the Bucks reached the Eastern Division Finals in 1970, won the NBA Championship in 1971 (in their 3rd season, faster than any team except for the league's early days), reached the Western Conference Finals in 1972, and took the 1974 NBA Finals to 7 games before losing to the Boston Celtics.
Age caught up with them, including the retirement of Oscar Robertson, and they fell below .500. Kareem demanded a trade. They soon rebuilt, and have since been good more often than not, but have not been back to the NBA Finals in 44 years.
4. 1993-99 Green Bay Packers. Otherwise known as the Brett Favre Era. Over 6 straight Playoff seasons, the Pack won 3 NFC Central Division titles, reached 3 NFC Championship Games, won Super Bowl XXXI, and lost Super Bowl XXXII thanks to a great comeback by the Denver Broncos. Green Bay was Titletown again.
3. 1929-31 Green Bay Packers. This was the 1st team to win 3 straight NFL Championships, although they did so before there was an NFL Championship Game. They went 12-0-1 in 1929, 10-3-1 in 1930, and 12-2 in 1931. In 1932, they didn't finish 1st overall, but went 10-3-1. That's a 4-year record of 44-8-3 -- an average of 11-2-1. Pretty strong, in any era.
2. 1936-44 Green Bay Packers. Otherwise known as the Don Hutson Era. Despite being in the same division as their arch-rivals, the Chicago Bears, at the Monsters of the Midway's most monstrous, they won 5 NFL West Division titles, and won the 1936, 1939 and 1944 NFL Championships.
1. 1960-68 Green Bay Packers. Otherwise known as the Vince Lombardi Era. In 1958, they were 1-10-1. Then Lombardi was hired as head coach and general manager. In 1959, he got them to 7-5. In 1960, he got them to the NFL West Division Championship, losing the Championship Game. Then they won back-to-back Championships in 1961 and 1962, and then became the 1st, and still the only, team to win 3 straight NFL Championship Games, in the 1965, 1966 and 1967 seasons. After the '66 and '67 seasons, they won the 1st 2 Super Bowls.
For the Baby Boom generation, except maybe for people in and around Baltimore who treasure the 1958-71 Colts, the 1960s Packers are still the team by which all other NFL teams are measured.
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