Nets hire Lionel Hollins to replace Jason Kidd
Lionel Hollins will be the Nets' fourth coach in the last two years, emerging from a rapid search by GM Billy King following the Jason Kidd fiasco.
The 60-year-old agreed to replace Kidd on Wednesday, just hours after Kidd was officially announced as coach of the Bucks. It's another financial commitment from Mikhail Prokhorov, considering the Hollins' contract is worth more than the $2.6 million annually he was paying Kidd.
At some point in the process the Nets reached out to UConn to check on the availability of Kevin Ollie, sources told the Daily News, but they were told he was remaining with the Huskies. Ollie, who won the NCAA title with the Huskies this year, was also approached by the Cavaliers about their coaching positions this offseason, sources said.
The Nets interviewed only one other candidate besides Hollins, but GM Billy King declined to reveal the identity because that person wasn't interested in the position. King, along with his associates in basketball operations, dined with Hollins on Monday night and met with him and Nets ownership again on Tuesday morning.
It was a quick process as the Nets wanted to cleanse themselves of Kidd and offer stability to free agents. The Nets lost out on free-agent Shaun Livingston, who agreed to a deal with the Warriors on Tuesday night. They're confident in re-signing Paul Pierce, and Kevin Garnett is also expected to return to a group that includes Deron Williams, Joe Johnson and Brook Lopez.
Hollins is a defensive-minded coach who took Memphis to the 2013 Western Conference finals with a slow-paced post-up game featuring Zach Randolph and Marc Gasol. His contract was not renewed by the Grizzlies before last season and he waited out for another head coaching spot, landing in Brooklyn.
He brings a 214-201 career coaching record to the Nets, along with the NBA championship he won as a player with the Trailblazers in 1977.
'If you look at track record and what he did in Memphis, he was able to go in there and take a team, added some veterans and they continually got better,' King said on Tuesday. 'He developed some young guys, Gasol, some bug guys. If you look at Memphis, they got consistently got better every year. All the way to the Western Conference Finals.'
If you count Kiki Vandeweghe - who Prokhorov fired right after he purchased the Nets - Hollins will be the fifth coach under the Russian owner, joining Avery Johnson, PJ Carlesimo and Kidd.
Kidd's departure was the most shocking and controversial, though, and it left the Nets down a path that led to Hollins.
'The organization's got to be bigger than one person,' King said. 'If you sit there and say one person leaves and everything comes falling down, then you don't have an organization. So we're not where we were like a week ago, but I think we can get back there quickly.'
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