First-year head coach JJ Redick will reportedly add two experienced coaches to his Los Angeles Lakers staff.
According to The Athletic’s Jovan Buha, the Lakers are hiring Nate McMillan and Scott Brooks as assistant coaches. Buva noted that they have a combined 43 years of coaching experience, including 31 as head coaches.
“The Lakers had wanted to hire at least two former head coaches for the front of Redick’s bench and now they’ve landed two of the most experienced candidates available,” Buha wrote Wednesday.
Gregg Popovich, Doc Rivers, and Rick Carlisle are the only active head coaches with more career NBA wins than McMillan’s 760.
After playing with the Seattle Supersonics for over a decade, McMillan stayed with the organization as an assistant coach in 1998. He replaced Paul Westphal as head coach in 2000, leading Seattle to the 2002 and 2005 postseasons before going to the Portland Trail Blazers.
McMillan led the Blazers to three consecutive playoff appearances, but each run ended in the first round. A similar pattern occurred when his Indiana Pacers suffered four straight opening-round eliminations from 2017 to 2020.
McMillan took over for the Atlanta Hawks during the 2020-21 campaign and steered them to the Eastern Conference Finals. But they fired him when going into the 2023 All-Star break at 29-30.
Meanwhile, Brooks notched a .620 winning percentage during seven seasons with the Oklahoma City Thunder. He led a young group featuring Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, and James Harden to the 2012 NBA Finals before winning 60 games the following year.
The Washington Wizards won 49 games (their highest tally since 1979) in Brooks’ first season, but he oversaw three losing seasons before losing his job in 2021. He spent the last three seasons as an assistant coach in Portland.
The Lakers will hope McMillan and Brooks can help expedite Redick’s learning curve. The former shooting guard and ESPN analyst hasn’t coached in any capacity at the pro or collegiate level.
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