Wizards perform amazing feat -- reach .500

WASHINGTON -- Chris Whitney is the only Washington Wizards player remaining from the team's last seven-game winning streak. It was so long ago, he doesn't remember it.

But many, many losing streaks are very fresh in his mind, and that makes the current seven-game run very, very sweet.

"Oh, definitely. I've been here for a long time," said Whitney, who signed in March 1996, a few weeks before that last seven-game spurt, the Wizards' longest winning streak of the 1990s.

"To have something like this -- not just a streak, but for it to mean something. It's early in the season, and for us to be in the thick of things in the division is great."

It is December, and the Wizards (12-12) are .500. Michael Jordan, coach Doug Collins and the supporting cast have lifted the malaise off the MCI Center and bucked the losing culture that Collins feared was sucking the team down earlier in the season.

"I told our guys, there are three things in sports or in life," Collins said. "There's losers, there's winners, and then there's a champion. I said we're moving to be winners. That's our next step: to be winners."

The Wizards actually blew out a team Wednesday night, crushing Atlanta 103-76. Jordan had one hot quarter -- scoring 18 of his 23 points in the second -- but his teammates did their share, and he was able to rest his knees the final 15 minutes of the game.

Afterward, Jordan said "there's such a positive feeling" in the locker room and that the players think they can win any game they're about to play. Those are old cliches in other cities, but it's a novel experience for the Wizards.

"I don't think it's anything like the Chicago Bulls the years that we won. I don't think these guys are walking around with swaggers," Jordan said. "We're very proud. The feeling is infectious, and we want to keep it going.

"Everybody in this locker room, when we take showers, feels the difference from the way it was last year. I don't think anybody wants that feeling back."

If the Wizards beat Orlando on Friday, they'll have their first eight-game winning streak since 1983. It's an amazing recovery from a 3-10 start -- including an eight-game losing streak -- and it started the night Jordan declared, "We stink," following a loss to Cleveland on Nov. 27. The Wizards are 9-2 since.

"I think I pointed out something that everybody felt," Jordan said. "We all looked at ourselves. We felt that we could play better basketball. From that point on, we've been focusing, and we're starting to understand how to be professional. ...

"I think we're surprising ourselves -- in terms of how everybody's fit into a role. We're starting to excel."

There are many reasons for the turnaround. Players such as Richard Hamilton, who were questioning their roles early in the season, are no longer tentative and have grown comfortable with the notion of Jordan as a teammate.

Thus, Jordan is no longer having to do everything. His shot attempts are down, and his assists are up. He is having to play fewer minutes because of tendinitis in his knee, giving his teammates even more responsibility. He reminds his teammates repeatedly that he's not the type of player he used to be, that he's here to help the franchise grow.

The front-office decision by Jordan to trade for Brendan Haywood looks like a brilliant move. The rookie center, who missed the first 11 games with a thumb injury, had seven blocks Wednesday night and is providing an inside presence.

Then there's Collins, the new coach with the new system who admits he really didn't understand his team until a month into the season.

"I wish that I would have had another month of training camp," Collins said.

For Washington fans, the whole experience is quick deja vu. The Redskins, also under a new coach, amazed everyone by getting to .500 with a long losing streak (0-5) followed by a long winning streak (5-0).

The football team appears to be headed for a .500-or-so finish, a disappointment by Redskins standards. The Wizards, however, would take it in a heartbeat -- because it would probably earn a playoff spot in the weak Eastern Conference.

"We've haven't won anything other than getting ourselves to a .500 record," Jordan said. "We're playing better. We're competing a lot harder. We're trying to be smarter as a team, and our young kids are growing real fast. But I don't think we want to jump the gun and say we're one of the elite teams in the East. I like it when we're underdogs."