Brandon Apter (@bapter23), Managing Editor
This past Saturday, we learned that the Sixers were "in talks" with Mike D'Antoni about an associate head coach position with the team. Six days later, it seems like those talks have evolved into a deal. According to Keith Pompey of the Philadelphia Inquirer, two league sources indicated that the veteran NBA coach is indeed headed to the Sixers and he was spotted at the airport when he arrived earlier this week.
Veteran NBA coach Mike D'Antoni is now the associate head coach of the 76ers, two league sources said Thursday night.
D'Antoni, 64, was spotted when he arrived at Philadelphia International Airport. He had been in talks with the Sixers to join their coaching staff.
D'Antoni has a 455-426 record as a head coach and has spent time over 12 years with the Suns, Knicks, Lakers and Nuggets. He and new chariman of basketball operations, Jerry Colangelo, have a relationship that dates back to early in the 2000s, during his stint with the Phoenix Suns, where he went 253-156 as head coach. Colangelo was also the chairman while both of them worked on the USA Basketball staff.
While it may seem coincidental that the D'Antoni hiring comes shortly after the hiring of Colangelo, Sixers coach Brett Brown, who fully endorses the D'Antoni addition, indicated that the Sixers had been speaking with the former head coach for a while now. Brown recently inked a two-year extension with the Sixers, keeping him there through 2019.
"It's true, we have been speaking with him," said Brown, who signed a contract extension on Friday. "For a while now we've been trying to figure out where we are as a staff. We have the youngest team in the history of the game and the staff was designed to cater to that, tilted extremely on development and energy. Having a graybeard, true-veteran type NBA coach has been discussed for a while as it relates to growing my staff. Vance Walberg and Chad Iske left last year and we opted to take our existing staff, which I think is fantastic and I love and has been great to me, and grow them. It's just something that has been kind of ever-present for a while. The timing is disturbing of a leak. We have been talking about it for a while."
"This is a good thing. That name is a good thing," said Brown. "How can that not be a good thing? I want to make sure that it's delivered with that spirit. I will be transparent as this plays out. I think what's most fair to say is Mike D'Antoni is of special interest to me." [Philly.com]
During his time in Phoenix, D'Antoni's teams were known for their fast pace of play, something Brown has been trying to instill since joining the Sixers in 2013. Steve Nash was the cornerstone of D'Antoni's teams in Phoenix, where he averaged 58 wins per year from the 2004-05 season to the 2007-08 season. The point guard spot is one that hasn't been figured out yet for the Sixers, so D'Antoni will have some great incite to mentor the young players as the Sixers continue to seek light at the end of this rebuild tunnel.
