Nets flag power, effort as points to handle with new coach

NEW YORK — Brooklyn Nets normal supervisor Sean Marks stated Tuesday evening that his choice to fireside head coach Jacque Vaughn was not due to a single occasion.

Marks additionally asserted that one particular occasion — the Nets selecting to sit down most of their roster for a recreation towards the Milwaukee Bucks on Dec. 27, a choice that finally price the franchise $100,000 for violating the league’s participant participation coverage — was not the foundation explanation for the crew’s spiral ever since.

“I do not assume we misplaced the crew that day,” Marks stated at a information convention previous to Brooklyn’s first follow with Kevin Ollie because the crew’s interim coach. “I recognize the truth that gamers need to play. They need to play evening in and evening out.

“Once more, I do not assume there was one choice that finally affected the file or [making] this choice today. I feel numerous issues went into that.”

Brooklyn went from 15-15 on the morning of the Bucks recreation to 6-18 since — tied with the Detroit Pistons for the third-worst file within the league over that span and forward of solely the Charlotte Hornets (6-20) and the Washington Wizards (4-21).

When requested for specifics on what led to Vaughn’s firing, Marks pointed to a scarcity of power and energy performs that equate to successful basketball.

“It is in regards to the degree of compete,” Marks stated. “We’re not going to be probably the most gifted crew within the league. I am not an fool. I completely perceive that. However on the identical time, this can be a gifted group of younger males on the market. And my expectations, and I feel their expectations, must be to carry one another accountable to do the little issues. The trouble performs, the free balls, the contested pictures and so forth, diving on the ground.

“These are issues that must be anticipated once you’re in a spot that we’re at proper now, the place we’re clawing and grappling for each single factor we will. That is what I might hope to see over these subsequent 28 video games, and that is in all probability, to be fairly frank, some issues I have never seen. The extent of effort and the extent of compete has not all the time been there.”

It actually hasn’t been over the previous a number of weeks, because the Nets (21-33) have gone 6-18 starting with that Dec. 27 loss, falling out of the play-in image.

The duty of fixing that transferring ahead will now fall to Ollie, who gained a nationwide championship as head coach at UConn in 2014 and likewise spent 13 seasons as an NBA participant earlier than becoming a member of Vaughn’s employees as an assistant coach this previous summer time.

When requested how he would go about altering that lack of power and hustle performs, Ollie had a plan to handle that.

“I obtained one thing known as EGBs, which is power producing behaviors, and it is 17 behaviors of these issues. And we went by way of the listing extensively at this time,” Ollie, 51, stated with a smile after conducting his first follow in his new position. “[They] don’t have anything to do with expertise however the whole lot to do with coronary heart and can. And I feel that is what it comes all the way down to.

“Keep in mind, I performed 15 years professionally, 13 years on this league, and by no means as soon as [had] a coach name a play for me. I needed to get it with grit. I needed to get it with willpower. I needed to get it with a mindset that we will get higher every day. That is how I coach, that is what I’ll demand. I would like them to demand that from me, and that is from day one.”

Ollie then went on to quote the crew’s lack of aggression in going after free balls (No. 25 within the league, per NBA.com’s monitoring information) and in drawing prices (the Nets have drawn solely six in 54 video games).

“We will not have these issues,” Ollie stated. “That is dropping basketball, to me. Profitable and dropping, that is a part of the outcomes, nevertheless it’s additionally the method, and the method is these EGBs and the way we get misplaced in these issues and the way we hunt for ’em every day.

“I would like hunters. For those who hunt, you are going to play. For those who do not hunt, you are not going to play.”

A type of “hunters,” Mikal Bridges, stated a number of occasions after follow that the Nets have to have extra element and group. When requested particularly about what occurred following the Dec. 27 recreation — when Bridges publicly expressed his displeasure over being pulled after the primary quarter — he echoed Marks in saying the Nets’ struggles cannot be traced again to 1 occasion.

“I do know numerous guys are out, and out and in of the lineup, however I feel simply — we simply weren’t locked in sufficient on each ends in doing what we’re imagined to do,” stated Bridges, who added he discovered in regards to the choice to let Vaughn, 49, go simply earlier than it was introduced by the crew on Monday. “And issues we had been doing, I feel we simply needed to be a bit of bit extra detailed. It was simply powerful on all of us. Coaches, us … we did not play to our requirements, and that is how it’s.”

The place Marks, Ollie and Bridges all agreed is that throughout the 28 video games in 55 days the Nets have to shut out their common season, there may be nonetheless time for this group to get again into the play-in combine.

However every time their marketing campaign is over, Marks stated Nets proprietor Joe Tsai will give him the chance to rent a fourth coach throughout his tenure with the franchise — one which started eight years in the past this week.

“Joe and I’ve all the time been in full partnership,” Marks stated. “And it doesn’t suggest we all the time agree. I imply, you need to have good discussions and sturdy discussions, however Joe and I’ll make this choice, and he has given me no motive to imagine that I will not be capable to make that call.

“We’ll take numerous elements under consideration as we make this. We have got time. We’re not going to be in a rush. There’s going to be a strong search. And by the tip of this, I’ve little doubt that we’ll come and discover the most effective particular person match for this job.”