Atkinson, who was in his fourth season, and the team “mutually agreed to part ways,” according to a statement on Saturday. Kenny Atkinson will no longer be the head coach of the Nets after he and the team “mutually agreed to part ways,” the team abruptly announced on Saturday. Jacque Vaughn, an assistant, will serve as interim head coach for the rest of the season. “It’s time for another voice in the locker room,” Sean Marks, the general manager of the Nets, said at a news conference on Saturday afternoon.
“It’s time that we both part ways. ” The announcement, which first came through a statement in Marks’s name on Saturday morning, was stunning, especially given the injuries the team has endured this year. The Nets are the No. 7 seed in the Eastern Conference even though their record is just 28-34 with 20 games to go until the playoffs.
Marks, at the news conference, was complimentary of Atkinson and said that he was “eternally grateful for what he’s done” but added, “I think we have both come to realize that it had ran its course here. ” Marks was vague about what went wrong and why Atkinson was not given the chance to keep coaching until Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving, the team’s two best players, were able to take the court together. Both were signed in the off-season, but Durant has not played at all and Irving has missed most of the season because of their injuries. “I would have loved to have seen him coach those guys,” Marks said.
“There’s no question at that. But the situation and circumstances of where we’re at today, we’re trying to take this program from where we are now to another level. ” Marks said discussions about Atkinson’s future had been occurring for months, but he would not elaborate. “What happens in the locker room, I’d like to think, stays in there,” he said.
“I’d love to give specifics and granular on all different kinds of things. But at the end of the day, this is a compromise that Kenny and I and ownership came up with. ” Atkinson gave a “brutally honest” assessment of himself, according to Marks, and said that his “voice was not what it once was” in the locker room. Marks tried to tamp down speculation that Durant and Irving had pushed Atkinson out.
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“This was a decision that wasn’t even about Kevin and Kyrie, Caris, Joe, Spencer,” Marks said, referring to Durant, Irving, Caris LeVert, Joe Harris and Spencer Dinwiddie. He said the players had been told this morning about Atkinson’s departure. Before the news conference, Joe Tsai, the owner of the Nets, posted a message on Twitter: “I am extremely grateful to Kenny Atkinson for what he’s done for our franchise over the years. If we did not have him, we would not be where we are with promising young guys still improving.
” This was Atkinson’s fourth year as the Nets’ coach, and in his tenure, he had received plaudits for making the most of the roster and developing young talent. In his first three seasons, the Nets’ win totals rose each year, culminating in a 42-40 record and playoff berth last year. Atkinson’s record of 118-190 makes him the franchise’s fourth-winningest coach. This season has been difficult, though that had been somewhat expected.
Durant is expected to miss the whole year because of a torn Achilles’ tendon; Irving has missed most of it because of an injured shoulder. LeVert, one of the league’s up-and-coming players, missed almost two months because of an injured thumb. Marks and Atkinson, both first-timers in their jobs, had built a Nets team that rose from the cellar of the N. B.
A. to an unexpected playoff run last year — all without a bona fide perennial All-Star. Instead of tanking for a higher draft pick, the Nets squeezed out every win they could as they preached accountability and effort. In his statement on Saturday, Marks said Atkinson was “instrumental in developing our players and building the identity and culture we have become known for over these past four seasons.
” Asked whether he was concerned with what Atkinson’s departure would mean for the franchise’s culture, Marks said: “Kenny is certainly one piece, and a very big piece, driving our culture for the last four years. No doubt, no denying that. What I am proud of is, you know, we have 65 basketball coaching staff driving culture.
“There’s a coaching staff.”
A performance staff. Analytics group. The players. And these guys are all going to drive the culture.
” Several Nets players expressed surprise at the news at the team’s training center on Saturday. “Obviously, it hurts,” said LeVert, who has spent his whole career playing for Atkinson. “It’s part of the business. This part of the business sucks.
” “I think, for the guys that have been here for the last few years with him, you’re upset,” said Harris, a swingman who came into his own under Atkinson. “You learned a lot. It’s also one of those things where you’re grateful for the time, the opportunity that you had with him. We all loved playing for Kenny.
” Last year’s team was greater than the sum of its parts. It was routinely competitive because of its above-average defense even when outmatched in talent. Atkinson would not hesitate to bench his best player, D’Angelo Russell, if he did not like his effort. One of that team’s most rousing wins was a comeback against the Sacramento Kings in March after being down 28 points in the second half.
In the first round of the playoffs, the Nets even won a game against the heavily favored Philadelphia 76ers. Players on other teams noticed the hard-nosed play. On a podcast in October, Durant said, “They’ve got the championship mind-set already. ” But this season got off to a rough start as the Nets opened 4-7.
Irving, however, put together several dazzling performances, giving many fans hope that the team could thrive even as it awaited Durant’s return from injury. There were signs of strife, however, as the season progressed. After a January loss to the 76ers, Irving said that the deficiencies in the Nets roster were “glaring” and that the team needed “one more piece or two more pieces. ” Irving would play in just six games after that — bringing him to 20 for the season — before he was ruled out for the rest of the year because of his shoulder injury.
He had surgery on Tuesday. That night, the Nets came back from a 17-point fourth-quarter deficit to knock off the Boston Celtics on the road, a game in which LeVert scored 51 points. Atkinson’s departure four days later came hours after a 19-point victory over the San Antonio Spurs. The move is the latest surprise in an especially tumultuous year for New York basketball.
Before the season, both the Knicks and the Nets overturned their rosters with the hope of significant improvement. Instead, each team has fired its head coach — the Knicks parted ways with their president, Steve Mills, as well — and is in the midst of disappointing seasons. The Knicks, at 19-44, have little chance of making the playoffs, though the Nets may be able to. Before joining the Nets, Atkinson was an assistant coach with the Atlanta Hawks under Mike Budenholzer, who is now the head coach of the league-leading Milwaukee Bucks.
Atkinson was also a Knicks assistant from 2008 to 2012. Vaughn, who now takes over the Nets, was a reserve in the N. B. A.
for 12 years, including two seasons with the Nets, before retiring in 2009. He was head coach of the Orlando Magic from 2012 to 2015. He compiled a 58-158 record and was fired in his third season. Vaughn joined the Nets staff the next year as an assistant.
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