Doc Rivers lured to Bucks by shot at championship،
MILWAUKEE — When Doc Rivers flew to Dallas this week, he planned to spend more time with his daughter and son-in-law before broadcasting an ESPN game between the Mavericks and Phoenix Suns on Wednesday night.
Instead, when he checked his phone Tuesday afternoon, he received what he called “a lot of urgent messages” following news of the firing of the Milwaukee Bucks' first-year coach, Adrian Griffin.
At this point, Rivers said he's comfortable with being out of coaching after being fired last summer after three seasons as coach of the Philadelphia 76ers. He said he had been contacted several times about a vacant coaching position since then, but had not returned the call and would not do so in the future – unless it's the right position.
Enter Milwaukee, where he was an All-American at Marquette in the 1980s and where his retirement jersey number hangs in the rafters of Bucks arena. Then think about the team he inherits, with two superstars in Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lillard and a chance to win a championship.
“You know the answer. Giannis, Lady. Really, that's the answer,” Rivers said during his introductory press conference Saturday morning. “You look at their team. What is it, eight teams that have a legitimate shot [at a championship]? And I don't know if it's that high, but the Bucks are one of them, right?
“The other thing is how they're built with the veterans and their adults. I thought if you get into this activity at this time of year, that would be a type of group that you have the best opportunity to connect and change as quickly as possible.”
Rivers, 62, was introduced at a news conference sitting next to Bucks general manager Jon Horst on Saturday morning, three days after Horst sat at the same table to talk about firing Griffin after only 43 games into his first year as coach despite going 30-13. save. Although Rivers acknowledged that he and Griffin had spoken several times – “Adrian and I are good friends, I wanted him to succeed,” Rivers said – he and Horst denied that Rivers was employed by the team before this week.
The Bucks finished the second half of a back-to-back Saturday night with a blowout victory over the New Orleans Pelicans; Rivers is scheduled to make his coaching debut on the road Monday night against the Denver Nuggets.
After Saturday's win, Antetokounmpo spoke about his first impressions of Rivers and the expectations he has set for himself.
“You can tell he has great energy about him,” Antetokounmpo said. “From the first meeting to the second meeting, he was wondering what about the team, how can we hold each other accountable, how can we touch each other, how can we come together as a team , how can we move forward. the ball, just the energy he has, he gives you a lot of confidence.”
Lillard echoed that sentiment, saying Rivers wouldn't be afraid to challenge the team.
“His voice, how he’s able to motivate teams,” Lillard said. “He's a strong voice. He's going to demand more from our team. He's not going to be afraid to challenge me, he's not going to be afraid to challenge Giannis…all the way down the line.
“I think when you're dealing with a team full of veterans and as talented as we are, I think that's something you need if you want to get to the level that we want to get to.”
As of Monday, the Bucks will have 36 games remaining in the regular season before the playoffs begin.
“I've never done that. I wouldn't wish that on anyone, I can tell you that, in a day and a half,” Rivers said of taking over a team midseason. “It's going to be a challenge. It's a challenge I'm racing towards. We have to get organized quickly. We can't try to do too much too soon. We're in the middle of a season, so we have to try to keep our pace.
“There are changes we need to make, there's no doubt about it. We're going to start working on them immediately.
Antetokounmpo said it will be a team-wide effort to get everyone on the same page.
“It’s going to take time, but the biggest thing he emphasized is building a team,” Antetokounmpo said. “The more we are together as a team, the sooner we will get to where we want to get.”
One big change Rivers noted in this job compared to his previous stops was the team culture. In Los Angeles and Philadelphia, Rivers said he believed he was hired to change the team's culture as much as to coach games. But he thought Milwaukee already had a solid foundation, it was his job to just coach.
And this will be the 25th consecutive NBA season in which Rivers has been a head coach, starting before the 1999-2000 season with the Orlando Magic. The Bucks will be the fifth franchise to hire Rivers as head coach.
“I don’t know if I have anything to prove except that I want to win,” Rivers said. “I like to win. I like to put myself in these situations.
“I've been through everything, really as a coach. That's the great thing about coaching. There's a lot of ups, there's downs, and you work on them and you always learn from them .At the end of the day, it's about relationships. Your job as a coach is to get certain guys to do certain things they don't want to do.
“You're not going to be popular all the time and that's fine, you have to accept that when you take on a leadership role. That's just part of it. But if you can get buy-in and get everyone on board and be on the same page, then you can be successful.”
