Great Basketball Coaches (Part 2)
Avery Johnson:
Avery Johnson was born in New Orleans, Louisiana on 25th of March, 1965. Like most of the other coaches in basketball, he also played the game before he taught it. He currently coaches the New Jersey Nets, and has also coached Dallas Mavericks.
His coaching helped the Mavericks rack in their first NBA finals.
Johnson started his time with Mavericks in 2004, when he had retired from playing. He became head coach a year later. With Johnson's help, the Mavericks managed their 2004-05 season with a win/loss ratio of 16-2. In April 2005, this “Little General”, as
he was called in his basketball days, received the NBA Coach of the Month award.
During his second season with Mavericks, he won his second NBA Coach of the Month award. Avery Johnson is the first coach to ever win two of these awards in his first two years into the profession. He was also named the fastest coach to ever reach 50 wins
and led the Mavericks to their second best win-loss record in all of the Western Conference.
He was again awarded the NBA Coach of the Year award in 2006. It was in the same year that the Mavericks were led to their first Finals match which they lost to the Miami Heat. In 2008, Avery became a studio analyst for ESPN but left the job when he got
an offer to be the head coach of New Jersey Nets.
Robert Montgomery (Bob Knight):
Robert Montgomery is a retired basketball coach. Also known as the “General” by his fellow peers, Knight won over 900 NCAA Division I men’s college basketball games. He coached the Indiana Hoosiers, leading them to 3 NCAA championships, 1 National Invitation
Tournament and 11 Big Ten Conference championships.
In 1984, he was made the coach of United States Men’s Olympic team and with his help, the team won the gold medal. There were many controversies surrounding this coach. It is said that he once threw a chair onto the court during a game and also physically
assaulted a police officer.
However, at the same time, the fact that he ran a “clean” team and had most of his players graduate, earned him a lot of praise and respect. After taking a position at Texas Tech, Bob Knight retired from coaching on 4th of February, 2008.
Mike Krzyzewski:
Mike Krzyzewski was born on 13th of February, 1947 in Chicago, Illinois. He is the son of Emily M. and William Krzyzewski. Krzyzewski currently coaches the Duke Blue Devils as well as the United States men’s national basketball team.
He has so far led the Blue Devils to 4 NCAA championships, 11 Final Fours, 12 ACC regular season titles and 12 ACC Championships. He became the sixth man to reach the 800 wins mark in men’s basketball. Krzyzewski was also written into the Naismith Memorial
Basketball Hall of Fame after the 2001 season.
Mike started coaching Duke after a 5 year run in the army. He has taught a lot to the players and the assistant coaches, who trained under him. A lot of them have branched out and have gotten into the coaching professions themselves.
Donald Arvid Nelson:
Donald Arvid Nelson was born in Muskegon, Michigan on 15th of May, 1940. He coached Milwaukee Bucks, New York Knicks, Dallas Mavericks and Golden State Warriors. NBA officially ranked him as one of the top 10 coaches in the history of the association.
He is the coach with the most number of NBA wins, 1333 in total.
Nelson started coaching Milwaukee Bucks in 1976. He earned two Coach of the Year Awards in 1983 and 1985. While Nelson was with the Bucks, the team was considered to be one of the best in the league. Nelson had an innovative mind. He was in fact the person
who started the concept of point forward- a tactic which uses small forwards to direct the offence.
When he left Bucks, he had already done 10 seasons out of which 7 had 50+ wins. After leaving the coaching scene for one year, Nelson returned as the coach for Golden State Warriors. He received his third NBA Coach of the Year Award. With Nelson in charge,
the Warriors went on to win many seasons and playoffs.
Donald played with Warriors for only 4 years. In 1995, he joined Knicks only to leave them after one year due to some personal issues with the team itself. Nelson then became the head coach for Dallas Mavericks and led them to four consecutive 50 point win
seasons.
He created an offence where each player could score at any given time but Nelson stepped down in 2005. In the next year, he replaced Mike Montgomery as the coach for Warriors once again and led them to 5 regular season games, while also qualifying for the
playoffs and the finals, only to lose to Utah Jazz. Nelson decided to retire in 2010.
(To be continued in Part 3)
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