The interim Brooklyn Nets head coach does not foresee any whole sale changes to his rotation and believes that results can achieved with the available talent .....
After losing five of the their last six and 10 of their last 13 games, the Brooklyn Nets sacked their head coach Avery Johnson this Thursday, naming P.J. Carlesimo as the interim man incharge.
And as the Nets prepare to play six games in the next 9 days, Carlesimo doesn’t want any major changes to his rotation.
"I liked the vast majority of everything we were doing," Carlesimo said before Brooklyn Nets took on the Charlotte Bobcats at the Barclays Center. "Maybe we're going to simplify a little bit, maybe we're going to tweak some things. There won't be wholesale changes ... virtually none in the short term. We've gotta get through tonight and tomorrow night."
The axing of Johnson came as quite a surprise. It was only 24 days back when he was named as the Eastern Conference Coach of the Month for November, and injuries to Brook Lopez and poor form of Deron Williams had a lot to do with the recent struggles of the Nets. When asked about his feelings on the issue, especially now that he has become head coach, Carlesimo didn’t sound too excited;
"Obviously it's the worst way to become a head coach," added Carlesimo. "It's clearly not an ideal situation, but it's the way of the NBA."
A part of this has to do with the fact, that the Nets are actively searching for another head coach and have lined up several options including former Chicago Bulls and Los Angeles Lakers head coach and 11 times championship winner Phil Jackson. Jeff Van Gundy, Larry Brown and Williams’ former coach at Utah Jazz Jerry Sloan, are also thought to be in serious contention for the post.
Carlesimo, who has a NBA career record of 204-296 in the regular season and 3-9 in the playoffs, knows all that, but was more intent on concentrating on the task at hand.
The message to his players was clear - "We need to play hard."
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