A perfect season is a sports season, including any requisite playoff portion, in which a team remains and finishes undefeated (and typically, untied). The feat is extremely rare at the professional level of any team sport but has occurred more commonly at the collegiate and scholastic levels in the United States. A perfect regular season (known by other names outside the United States) is a season excluding any playoffs, where a team remains undefeated; it is less rare than a complete perfect season but still exceptional.
Exhibition games are generally not counted toward standings, for or against. For example, the 1972 Miami Dolphins lost three of their preseason exhibition games but are considered to have had a perfect season.
Basketball No National Basketball Association team has ever had a perfect season. , the 2015–16 Golden State Warriors have the best ever regular-season record in the NBA, with a record of 73–9, breaking the 1995–96 Chicago Bulls record of 72–10. However, the Warriors lost the 2016 NBA Finals to the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Two NBA teams have had nearly perfect regular seasons at their home arenas: The 1985–86 Boston Celtics finished with a 37–1 (.974) record at Boston Garden (the Celtics also won three home games at the Hartford Civic Center to bring that mark to 40-1) .The Celtics' only home loss occurred on December 6, 1985, to the Portland Trail Blazers by the score of 121–103. The Celtics also won all 10 of their home games (all in the Garden) in the postseason to finish 50–1 at home. The 2015–16 San Antonio Spurs also finished with a 40–1 (.976) record at AT&T Center. The Spurs' only regular-season home loss occurred on April 10, 2016, to the Golden State Warriors by the score of 92–86. In the playoffs, however, the Spurs were 3–2 at home, losing twice to the Oklahoma City Thunder in the conference semifinals to finish 43–3 (.935) at home.
Basketball leagues outside the NBA tend to have fewer games per season, thus making a perfect season more achievable: Khimik won the 2014–15 Ukrainian Basketball SuperLeague by winning all 30 regular season games, and winning all playoff games, for a 36–0 overall record. The American Basketball Association (2000–present) has seen four perfect seasons: Shreveport-Bossier Mavericks (2013–14 and 2014–15) Jacksonville Giants (2020–21) Chicago Fury (2024–25) In 2017, the three-on-three league BIG3, which featured an eight-game regular season and two-round playoff, had a perfect team in its inaugural season when Trilogy swept all ten games on their schedule. Fenerbahçe Women's Basketball team scored a perfect season in the 2023–24 Women's Basketball Super League by winning all 28 season games. The team also won all the championships that they competed in during the 2023–24 season: Turkish Women's Basketball Cup, FIBA Europe SuperCup Women and EuroLeague Women. Potawatomi Fire of The Basketball League had a perfect season in 2024 They had another perfect season in 2026. Raleigh Aces of the Women's American Basketball Association had a perfect season in 2024
Cricket County cricket English first-class county cricket has existed as the top tier of domestic cricket in England since the middle nineteenth century, and until the 1950s, it was up to the highest standard of the game. Seasons have varied in length: before the 1880s, they were generally less than ten matches in length and some "first-class" counties played only against one or two different opponents. Between 1887 and 1929, seasons were gradually increased in length to a standard twenty-eight matches for all counties. However, because of the development and popularity of one-day cricket, seasons have been reduced to twenty-four games in 1969 and twenty in 1972, though this was increased by two in 1977 and 1983. With an increase to four days for all games, sixteen or seventeen games have been played since 1993.
Also, because of improvements to pitches via the heavy roller and covering to protect from rain, the proportion of games "drawn" (not finished) has steadily risen since the 1870s.
Since tables of results have been kept in 1864,Wynne-Thomas, Peter; The Rigby A-Z of Cricket Records; pp. 53 to 67. the only team to have competed a true perfect season—winning outright every game—was Yorkshire in 1867 when led by George Freeman's and Tom Emmett's deadly fast bowling on uncovered and unrolled pitches, they won all seven county games.
Since 1868 numerous county teams in longer schedules have finished a season unbeaten, but none have managed to win every single game outright: + English first-class county teams with no losses in a season (qualification 8 or more games) Season Team Wins Losses Draws Remarks 1864 Surrey 6 0 2 Also defeated a combined England team by eight wickets 1876 Gloucestershire 5 0 3 W. G. Grace scored over 1,000 runs in August including the first two triple centuries in first-class cricket 1877 Gloucestershire 7 0 1 Defeated England by five wickets 1881 Lancashire 10 0 3 One match against Middlesex cancelled because Harrow Wanderers booked Lord's 1884 Nottinghamshire 9 0 1 Only draw against Surrey in August Bank Holiday game saw Surrey with three wickets in hand and 153 runs to win 1886 Nottinghamshire 7 0 7 1900 Yorkshire 16 0 12 Lost only two games, both at home to Somerset between 1900 and 1902.Did lose to MCC at Lord's with J. T. Hearne taking nine for 71 on a perfect pitch. 1904 Lancashire 16 0 10 1907 Nottinghamshire 15 0 4 One match abandoned against Yorkshire.Hallam and Wass took 298 wickets between them in very wet summer 1908 Yorkshire 16 0 12 1925 Yorkshire 21 0 11 Most games and most wins by unbeaten county team 1926 Yorkshire 14 0 17 Finished second, narrowly behind Lancashire who won seventeen games and lost two.Played seventy-one games without loss before losing to Warwickshire on May 23, 1927 1928 Lancashire 15 0 15 Went 35 games without loss and overall lost only once in eighty-three county games before losing to Sussex on May 24, 1929. 1928 Yorkshire 8 0 20 Finished fourth of seventeen teamsPlayed fifty-six unbeaten county matches before losing to Kent on July 1, 1929, but only won fourteen of these 1930 Lancashire 10 0 18 Had lost only four of last 135 games at end of season. 1969 Glamorgan 11 0 13 1972 Warwickshire 9 0 11 1973 Hampshire 10 0 10 1974 Lancashire 5 0 15 Finished only eighth of seventeen teamsLowest win percentage by unbeaten county team 1998 Leicestershire 11 0 6 Lost only two games between 1996 and 1998 1999 Surrey 12 0 5 Last season of single-division Championship 2004 Warwickshire 5 0 11 First Division 2008 Warwickshire 5 0 11 Second Division 2009 Durham 8 0 8 First Division 2012 Yorkshire 5 0 11 Finished second in Second Division
American football Pre-NFL era and competing leagues Predecessors to the National Football League such as the Ohio League, New York Pro Football League and Western Pennsylvania Professional Football Circuit had many perfect seasons: In western Pennsylvania, the 1900 and 1901 Homestead Library and Athletic Club teams and the 1903 Franklin Athletic Club had perfect seasons. In Ohio, the Massillon Tigers (1904, 1905), Akron Indians (1909), Shelby Blues (1911), and Dayton Triangles (1918) all had perfect seasons during this era. In 1918, the Buffalo Niagaras went 5–0–0 (6–0–0 including a forfeit) in 1918, in a league that consisted of teams entirely from the city of Buffalo in 1918. In 1920, the Union Club of Phoenixville played in a league consisting mostly of local teams and earned a perfect season, claiming for itself a mythical national championship.
The caliber of talent in these leagues was neither high nor consistent, the seasons were generally shorter than in the modern NFL, and it was common for top teams to play all their games at home while lesser teams played all of their games on the road. In 1918, for example, Dayton and Buffalo had the additional advantage of having its strongest competitors suspend operations due to the Spanish flu and the First World War, restrictions that also prevented the two teams from playing each other. Thus, it was much easier to earn a perfect season than it would become in the NFL.
1937 Los Angeles Bulldogs
In 1937, the Los Angeles Bulldogs joined the second American Football League after the Cleveland Rams defected to the NFL. Playing a combination of AFL teams and independent franchises (such as the Providence Steam Roller and the Salinas Packers), the team went 16–0, with 8 wins coming against AFL teams. The Pro Football Hall of Fame cites the Bulldogs’ dominance as one of the key factors in the AFL's demise, and as an independent team the next season, the Bulldogs finished with a 10–2–2 record, including a 2–1–2 record against NFL teams. Several of the team's players were invited to play on the "Pro All Stars" team in the NFL's first Pro All-Star Game in Los Angeles, and the Bulldogs are considered to be one of the few independent teams to have ever achieved parity with the NFL.
1948 Cleveland Browns
In 1948, the Cleveland Browns of the All-America Football Conference won all fourteen regular season games and the AAFC championship to finish the season with a 14–0–0 record. Cleveland's perfect 1948 season was part of a string of 29 straight wins from 1947 to 1949, including both the 1947 and 1948 title games. On April 1, 2025, the NFL voted to recognize AAFC statistics, awarding the 1948 Browns full recognition of a perfect season.
1972 Miami Dolphins
Since the National Football League began in 1920, only one team has played a perfect season: the 1972 Miami Dolphins, who won all fourteen of their regular season games and three postseason games, including Super Bowl VII, to finish the season 17–0–0.
It has often been reported that the surviving members of the 1972 Dolphins would, every season when the final undefeated team earned its first loss of the year, either gather to drink champagne or send a case of champagne to the team who beat this final undefeated team. Don Shula, the head coach of the 1972 Dolphins, denied this in a 2007 interview with ESPN.
On August 20, 2013, four decades after their accomplishment, President Barack Obama hosted the 1972 Dolphins noting that they "never got their White House visit".
Near perfect seasons Undefeated seasons (with ties) before introduction of playoffs Until the development of a playoff system in the NFL in 1932, there were four teams who completed seasons undefeated with one or more tied games: the 1920 Akron Pros, the 1922 Canton Bulldogs, the 1923 Canton Bulldogs, and the 1929 Green Bay Packers. According to the 2012 NFL Record & Fact Book, under NFL practices from 1920 to 1971, tie games were not included in winning percentage, giving these four teams perfect winning percentages of 1.000.
The 1921 Buffalo All-Americans were controversially denied an undefeated season because they believed that their final game, a 10–7 loss to the Chicago Staleys, was an exhibition game which would not count in the final standings. The NFL recorded that game as official and Buffalo's record as 9–1–2.
Team Wins Losses Ties1920 Akron Pros season 8 0 3 1922 Canton Bulldogs season 10 0 21923 Canton Bulldogs season 11 0 11929 Green Bay Packers season 12 0 1
NFL perfect regular seasons Apart from the 1972 Dolphins, three NFL teams have completed undefeated and untied regular seasons: the 1934 Chicago Bears, the 1942 Chicago Bears, and the 2007 New England Patriots. Each lost in the playoffs: In 1934, the Bears played a 13–0–0 regular season and became the first NFL team to complete an unbeaten and untied regular season but lost the 1934 NFL Championship Game against the New York Giants. Despite losing several players and head coach George Halas to military service in World War II, the 1942 Bears finished the regular season 11–0–0 but lost the NFL Championship Game to the Washington Redskins.