In the summer of 2013, the Boston Celtics, three years removed from winning their 17th NBA title, were in a moment of transition. It came time to change the structure of the team that can be a title contender in the future. They entrusted to lead that transition from the sidelines the latest guest on NBATV’s “#NBATogether” who led a relative unknown collegiate basketball program to back-to-back Final Four appearances and now had the Celtics (43-21), No. 3 currently in the Eastern Conference and in the mix to contend for their 18th NBA title once the 2019-20 NBA campaign resumes late next month.
The conversation via video chat between NBA on TNT studio host and co-host of TNT’s “Inside the NBA” Ernie and head coach of the Boston Celtics’ Brad Stevens, now in his seventh season began with how he and the team have processed and conversed about the Coronavirus (COVID-19) Pandemic, which put a pause on the NBA season on Mar. 11, to the eruption of three consecutive weeks of protests and loud calls against police brutality since the death of 47-year-old George Floyd in Minneapolis, MN.
Coach Stevens said that he has run through the “gamut” of emotions during this time that have consisted of a lot of “mourning; a lot of reflection; a lot of listening; a lot of learning.”
He also said that when the team has had individual conversations and when they have met as a team, they are motivated to create “long-term sustainable change.”
Coach Stevens added to that saying in the last few weeks that he has thought about in not just conversations with his team, but his own family, friends and fellow colleagues in the NBA, specifically in calls with the Coach’s Association led by Atlanta Hawks’ head coach Lloyd Pierce, who Coach Stevens said has done an “amazing” job that there are times like this one where you have to be the one to be led and not always the one doing the leading with your own words.
“I’ve really, you know, appreciate all those people that I’ve gotten to learn from and spend time with over the last few weeks,” Stevens said. “And I think we’re all motivated to, you know, show our conviction with our action.”
Perhaps a big part of that motivation and conviction for Coach Stevens and for others to rise to this moment is what one of his players, swingman Jaylen Brown did last week when he drove back to his hometown of Atlanta, GA to march alongside protestors in the wake of the Mr. Floyd’s death.
Coach Stevens said to Johnson that Brown, who is averaging career-highs of 20.4 points and 6.4 rebounds on 49.0 percent from the field and 38.1 percent from three-point range is an “unbelievable young player” that is who is going to do incredible things on the hardwood for years to come, and has already played at an incredible level that not too many in the early years of the NBA career try to reach during their progression.
As great of an impact that Brown will have on the court in his NBA career, Coach Stevens said that the No. 3 overall pick in 2016 out of the University of California, Berkeley will have an even greater impact off the hardwood.
“He’s exceptionally passionate,” Coach Stevens said of Brown. “We’ve had a lot of talks before the last couple of weeks about his ability to impact the room and his ability to impact others.”
“I think we all that have been around him every day know he’s gonna be a leader for what’s right. And we’re thrilled that he’s on our team, but his impact will go far beyond our team.”
Stevens’ youth while growing up in Zionsville, IN was consumed like most of state about hoops, first at Zionsville Community High School, where his marksmanship from the perimeter, especially from three-point range helped him set four school records for career scoring average (26.8), total career points (1,508), assists (444). steals (156), and points in a single-season (644 in 1995) as of 2017.
He would go on to attend DePauw University in Greencastle, IN, where he was a multi-time all-conference selection and a three-time Academic All-American.
Having basketball engrained into the fabric of his life as a youth played a major role in Coach Stevens being in the position that he is today as the head coach of the most celebrated and recognized franchises in “The Association.”
To put how much basketball meant to Coach Stevens, he mentioned how he would have walked for an hour or 90 miles to Bloomington, IN to play for the Indiana Hoosiers and Hall of Fame head coach Bobby Knight. If Coach Knight did not want him, Stevens said he would have walked up North to the rival school that he always rooted against in the Purdue Boilermakers and see if then head coach Gene Keady would give him a chance.
“I just think, it was such an unbelievable time in state of Indiana from a college point of view,” Stevens said of the college basketball scene in Indiana then.
Stevens recalled back when he was around 10, 11 years old when Hall of Famer and now NBA on TNT color analyst Reggie Miller was drafted by the Indiana Pacers at No. 11 overall back in 1987 out of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and saw them become a playoff perennial from the late 1980s to now and even were in the conversation of winning a title, which they had their chance in 2000, where they lost to Hall of Famer and fellow NBA TV/NBA on TNT analyst Shaquille O’Neal and Hall of Famer to be in the late Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers in six games.
Miller quickly became Stevens’ favorite basketball player, which is why he wore the No. 31 as a high schooler and collegian.
Basketball is such a part of Stevens life that his first date with his college sweetheart at DePauw and now wife Tracy, a labor and employment lawyer and the agent of the Celtics’ head coach was at an Indiana high school gym that seats 7,000 people.
When he went on recruiting trips to convince high schoolers to attend Butler University first as an assistant coach at Butler University from 2001-07 and then as the head coach from 2007-13, he would do so in gymnasiums that seat 10,000 people.
“It’s a unique commitment to that game and that game certainly means a lot to the people in those communities,” Stevens said about the symbolism of basketball to the communities of Indiana.
Before becoming a coach at Butler, Stevens worked at the pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly once he graduated from DePauw. In the summer of 2000, he was offered the chance to do volunteer work in the basketball office at BU.
Coach Stevens said that time in his early 20s was “more beneficial” to him than he ever realized because he learned a lot about mental health and was still “hungering” to be part of a team and compete.
He also said that he had the “desire” to be on the sidelines one time during “March Madness.”
It was then that Stevens was offered a low-paying administrative position as coordinator of basketball operations for the Bulldogs under then head coach Thad Matta, which Stevens who had taken a job at Applebee’s jumped on.
When Stevens said to Johnson how he drove to Butler after working at Lilly one day before he officially put in his letter of resignation to his bosses and sat in on a coaches meeting and learned in that moment he had a clue about coaching a game where he knew how to make a v-cut off a down screen in his sleep like any other youngster in the state of Indiana. He played for a great coach who used a bunch of offensive systems, including the famed “Triangle” system that the late great Hall of Fame coach Tex Winter perfected first at Kansas State and then for the Chicago Bulls and Lakers, that helped them to win a combined 11 Larry O’Brien trophies.
Stevens though did not know how to “communicate it, coach it or organize it” what he could do in his sleep to the Butler players.
“Think about each individual and what you need to do to get the best out of them,” he said. “Let alone recruiting and running a program, and all that other stuff. I just walked out of there overwhelmed.”
Coach Stevens while being overwhelmed walked out of that first meeting “inspired” and willing to learn and was around great people that wanted to help him get better.
It is because of that willingness to learn and people that wanted to pass that knowledge onto Stevens is what allowed him to be the coach that he became and the head coach he is now with the Celtics.
When asked by Johnson if it is harder to coach a team when you are not much older than the players? His answer was no.
It only becomes hard when you feel you cannot move in any way close to the level of the players you are trying to help get better.
Stevens not only found his voice as a coach but he found a way to connect with the players to the point that the Bulldogs became the Cinderella story of “March Madness” in 2010 and 2011 reaching the NCAA National Title Game. They lost in 2010 61-59 to the Duke University Blue Devils in 2010 and then to the University of Connecticut Huskies 53-41 the next year.
While Stevens said he does not recall each minutes of what occurred in those games or the what happened off the floor in the lead up to those runs where they finished short of reaching the top of the NCAA Basketball mountaintop, he did say he remembers the relationships, and the people that were a part of those great moments in Butler basketball history.
The biggest regret Stevens told Johnson from those back-to-back title game loses was being a coach at the ages of 33 and 34 then and he would “give anything” to be a part of those games now because of the knowledge he gained and being able to apply that knowledge.
“I would love to be able to go back with those [Butler] teams and put in a few different things and run a different offense and those types of things at different times or a defensive call here or there,” he said. “But that’s all part of it. I wouldn’t trade those years and certainly those relationships have been amazing.”
Stevens’ success at Butler, which as mentioned at one time seemed like dream led to other schools like the Oregon, Clemson and Wake Forest knocking at the door for his services, even getting pursued vigorously by the University of Illinois after the 2011-12 season. In March 2013, it was reported that UCLA offered Stevens between $2.5 and $3 million a year to be their head coach. Ultimately, Stevens decided to remain at the school that gave him his chance to be a head coach and said he would remain there as long as he had the support of the university and that they would never stray from running the basketball program the “right way.”
Five months later though, the Boston Celtics came knocking and Stevens answered the knock from general manager Danny Ainge and signed to be their 17th head coach in franchise history.
After going just 25-57 in the first season under Stevens, the Celtics have made the playoffs five straight seasons, reaching the Eastern Conference Finals in 2017 and 2018 falling to now current Lakers four-time Kia MVP LeBron James and the four-time defending Eastern Conference champion Cleveland Cavaliers in five and seven games respectably.
Last season, the Celtics finished well short of expectations falling in the East Semifinals to the East runner-up Milwaukee Bucks and reigning Kia MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo in five games.
That setback brought into question if Coach Stevens had to change his coaching approach when dealing with college athletes and now basically 12 millionaires.
Aside from adjusting to the length of the game being 48 minutes to the two 20-minutes halves you have in college; the lack of consistent practice time and being able to get straight to the point of what you want to accomplish when you first meet your team in training camp those first three weeks, what Coach Stevens said he has learned is that his players have been coached by so many great coaches that it is about having a structure, style and an organization on both ends that your team can brings out each players strengths.
It also requires Coach Stevens to make the necessary adjustments and the right substitutions in a game that will give the Celtics the best chance to win.
The other difference Coach Stevens said from college basketball and the NBA is the players choose the university they wan to play at and in the NBA you are drafted by a team where you are sign a contract for a certain amount of money to play for that squad and a team can decide trade you for a better player or draft picks to select someone who could be a better fit.
“But the one thing that is very consistent is all of the players at both levels all have want to improve. And they’ve all work to improve,” Coach Stevens said about the one common theme about college basketball and the NBA.
He also said that at both levels the players are “inspiring” to be around because it “creates” an environment where everyone can grow, and is a place where coach feels that they individually need to keep up because of all the improving he is seeing from his players.
One player who specifically has kept Coach Stevens on his toes is All-Star Gordon Hayward, who played for Stevens at Butler from 2008-10 and signed with the Celtics on July 14, 2017 on a reported four-year, $128 million deal in free agency.
Another player Stevens said who has made him better as a coach with the C’s is fellow All-Star guard Kemba Walker, who the Celtics acquired in a sign-and-trade with the Hornets on a four-year, $141 million on June 30, 2019. It was Walker, who broke the heart of Stevens and the Bulldogs in the 2011 NCAA Tournament Final where he scored 16 points himself to rally the Huskies to victory.
In the case of Hayward, Coach Stevens is coaching a not just an entirely different player from 16-year-old he once was. He is now 30 years of age and now married to his wife Robyn and is also a father to three daughters.
Coach Stevens saw Walker for the first time at an AAU Tournament at age 17 when he was playing for his AAU squad the New York Gauchos at the Peach Gym on a recruiting trip.
Unfortunately, Stevens said he was there to watch another player on the opposing team and Walker played so well that he made the person he came to check out seem not in the same class as the Harlem, NY native.
That player Stevens came to see in Ronald Nored, an assistant coach for the Charlotte Hornets now ended up being recruited by Butler and was the starting lead guard for both the school’s Final Four runs the previously mentioned decade.
During his time at Butler, Coach Stevens had seen or coached against in college a number of players that came through his early years with the Celtics and while you get a good natured ribbing about what they did to the team you previously coached but the page turns quickly to the moment at hand.
“But those relationships, you watch them play and grow forever. And both Gordon and Kemba are good examples of guys that were good when you first saw them. But the amount of work they’ve put in to become ever better is pretty remarkable.”
Along with having the likes of Hayward, Walker, Brown, and first-time All-Star Jayson Tatum on his team, what has made Coach Stevens one of the best coaches in the league is the calm demeanor he shows on the sidelines on gameday.
While he may be in control of all of his faculties for a majority of the time, he is just as competitive as those on his current coaching staff to the ones he worked him and played for him at Butler.
Stevens said that “competing” and being a part of a “team” is something that he has always loved. He did learn from his parents from an early age, especially his mother talked to him about keeping his composure and the importance of having a calm demeanor.
What will make Coach Stevens blow a fuse a majority of the time is when he does not have a good feeling about something that is out of his control.
That is why he prepares his team as well as he can and put the focus on what he and his team can control on the hardwood.
That is why you will really never see him screaming or losing his marbles over bad calls made by referees, which he feels get overblown when the camera catches you during the NCAA Tournament run or in the middle of the pressure cooker of the NBA Playoffs.
“I’ve learned that about myself and I just have to focus, and preparation is a big part of that,” Stevens said. “I’ve had a few memes on the internet that I’m not exactly proud that my kids, who are 14 and 11 can see and watch the words I’m mouthing. So, I think, we’re all developing in our own way I guess.”
The example that Stevens used is in his first season on the Celtics sidelines and veteran referee Marc Davis tossed him out of game when the Celtics played at the Sacramento Kings with 30 seconds left.
Stevens did not think he was overwhelmingly upset but Davis wanted to make a point he was tired of hearing him complaining and is giving the signal with his right arm for Stevens to hit the showers.
He says that anytime his oldest child is upset at him, Coach Stevens gets that picture and even told Davis that he has been thrown out of a game once in his career, but in his own home he is getting ejected seemingly every week.
One of the biggest things that Coach Stevens’ success has been predicated on is his ability to come up with a scheme that can slow the opposing team’s ability to put the ball in the basket at a high clip.
When Coach Stevens was a high school player, his coach had the team work on how they were going to defend down screens, isolation plays, and post plays, which was a huge emphasis back then.
Today, a big part of Coach Stevens defensive philosophy that he implores to his players with the Celtics is defending the pick-and-roll, which is the basic bread-and-butter of the other 29 NBA squad’s offensive system.
While Coach Stevens’ defensive schemes are different with the Celtics then they were when he was at Butler from the standpoint of the rules and defending certain offensive actions, but if the commitment is there do get the system down and know it from front to back as well as the adjustments that need to be made when called upon, there are a lot of different ways to skin a cat.
That is especially been proven true about how Coach Stevens’ Celtics teams execute at the offensive end out of timeouts and late in games.
“So, I think if I’m good at anything in coaching, I think the No. 1 thing I’m good at is being a thief,” Coach Stevens said.
What that means is he constantly watches a lot of film. He said that he has watched a lot of film going into every college he when he was at Butler. He would watch film each night before he would go to sleep. He also would watch three to four games of film of the Celtics; opponents they play against. On top of that, Coach Stevens said he would during the offseason catch a lot of games being played on the international stage.
“I’ve learned something from every coach I’ve ever watched. And that’s not an exaggeration,” he said. “It’s one of the reasons why as you’re fighting with all these people and you’re competing against all these people, you know, those are also I think beyond the players and people you work with, some of the relationships become the most important to you throughout this journey is, you know, you’re colleagues. People you’re coaching against because you have such respect for them and I certainly feel that way.”
The Boston Celtics took a major gamble in the eyes of many sevens years ago when they hired a 37-year-old college head coach to lead them back to championship glory. That game made by GM Danny Ainge has worked out quite nicely because he hired a individual in Brad Stevens who had a work ethic and an ability to connect with his players that he gained their trust and put their best foot forward to get better and to take the hardwood with a focus and determination to get the job done.
That is how the Boston Celtics have gotten to the precipice twice of competing for another title in 2017 and 2018 and are going to be again once the 2019-20 NBA campaign, barring any setbacks resumes play on July 31.
Information, statistics, and quotations are courtesy of 6/10/2020 8:30 p.m. edition NBATV’s “#NBATogether With Ernie Johnson: Brad Stevens;” https://www.espn.com/nba/standings; https://www.espn.com/nba/player/stats/_/id/3917376/jaylen-brown; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene_Keady; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tex_Winter; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Nored; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Hayward; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/DePauw_University; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reggie_Miller; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kemba_Walker#High_school_career; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Celtics#2019-present; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_NCAA_Division_I_Men%27s_Basketball_Tournament; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_NCAA_Division_I_Men%27s_Basketball_Tournament; and https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brad_Stevens.
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