Image via Getty/Stevie Visser
Mike Budenholzer has the best record in the East, Frank Vogel has the best record in the West. Erik Spoelstra has the Miami Heat surprising many, as does Billy Donovan with the Oklahoma City Thunder and Taylor Jenkins with the Memphis Grizzlies. Doc Rivers has had to maneuver without Paul George for at least half the season and load management and still has the Clippers sitting pretty behind the Lakers in second place in the West.
So why, then, is Nick Nurse the best candidate to win the NBA’s Coach of the Year award?
Simply put, the defending champion Toronto Raptors were given no chance of defending their title by NBA analysts all over. Even those most optimistic about the team’s chances saw them as the team that existed when Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan were the two main protagonists, the one that had too much institutional knowledge to finish with anything less than home court advantage but would ultimately bow out in the post-season in the absence of a true superstar.
Yet, at 46-18, Toronto looked in control of the second seed in the East with a three-game advantage over the Boston Celtics before the coronavirus-enforced stoppage. Nurse, along with the rest of his coaching staff, have navigated the Raptors past one obstacle after another to make it seem as though nothing was ever lost. In fact, the championship experience last year was only going to serve as fuel for what they could further gain this year.
Here are five reasons why Nurse has the resume of 2019-20 NBA Coach of the Year.
Managing Through Injuries
On Friday, Nov. 8, it appeared as though disaster struck the Raptors’ early season. Tipping off what was set to be an early stern test of a west coast trip against the New Orleans Pelicans, both Kyle Lowry and Serge Ibaka were out of the game before halftime with injuries. To this point, Nurse had employed a seven-man rotation and hardly used his bench—more on that later—and it looked as though the Raptors would struggle to cope with no dependable depth whatsoever.
Pascal Siakam torched the Pelicans in that game, but what followed against the Lakers, Clippers, and Blazers set the tone for the remainder of the season. The coach made no excuses, said that this was the time for the bench players to show they can be trusted, and pushed Siakam and VanVleet to be greater.
The Raptors pulled off a major upset against the Lakers with Nurse winning his first Coach’s Challenge at a pivotal moment. Trailing 64-60 with 7:36 remaining in the third quarter, Siakam was defending LeBron James when the Lakers superstar drove to the basket for an and-one. Nurse called for the challenge, which reversed the foul call and saved Siakam from his fourth of the game, resulted in a jump ball taking away two points for sure and possibly three. Toronto scored 13 of the next 20 points and never looked back.
Toronto finished the trip 3-2, then rode that never-say-die mentality the rest of the season. Per Man Games Lost NBA, no team has been more heavily impacted by injuries than the Raptors. In addition to Lowry and Ibaka, Siakam, VanVleet, Norman Powell, and Marc Gasol have all missed significant time this season and they’ve still managed to stand 28 games above .500. That doesn’t happen without excellent coaching.
Pushing All the Right Buttons at the Right Time
Let’s go back to when Nurse was using a seven-man rotation. Terence Davis had seen a bit of floor time, as had Patrick McCaw. But what of new signings Rondae Hollis-Jefferson, Matt Thomas, and Stanley Johnson, as well as Raptors 905 come-uppers Chris Boucher and Malcolm Miller? Nurse felt they just hadn’t learned what it was to play with a championship level intensity, and particularly singled out Hollis-Jefferson and Stanley Johnson.
“Those guys have not understood, a) how hard we play, b) our schemes, that defence is a priority for them, etcetera,” Nurse said on Oct. 16. “We've got some work to do with all that crew. I tell them there's a couple spots, come Tuesday (opening) night, there's a couple spots that are open if somebody wants them. I keep telling you, show me you're going to play defence, show me you're going to play hard, show me you understand our coverages, show me. And then, whatever you do at the other end, you're going to get opportunities just because of who you're on the floor with.”
After showing them some tough love, each of those players—with the exception of Stanley Johnson—has come through with notable contributions when called upon. Hollis-Jefferson and Boucher have arguably been the standouts of the group and have given the defending champions an extra zip about them when injuries looked to derail the Raptors’ season.
Over the course of this 2019-20 campaign, Nurse has challenged Siakam to stop getting in foul trouble, for Powell to develop consistency, for Davis to be more locked in and all of those moments served as catalysts to improvements in exactly the areas Nurse was hoping for.
Finding Room for Norm and Fred to Excel
Entering the season, both had a case for the starting guard position alongside Lowry. They both publicly stated their desire to have it, but Nurse went with VanVleet to open the season—who did not disappoint with 34 points in the season opener.
This could have resulted in some tension between the two players, and while much of the credit should go to the players for putting their egos aside, Powell’s development as a consistent scoring threat while VanVleet maintained his steady play has to be a check mark on the resume of Nurse’s as well.
He has acknowledged the importance of both of them throughout the season, and by keeping the position fluid—Powell has managed to start 23 of the 44 games he’s played—both have been major contributors to Toronto’s success.
Getting Janky With It
Nurse was hired by Masai Ujiri and co. because they believed they had found a coach who was going to be truly innovative and look to adjust on the fly as the league continues to evolve with the three-point revolution we’ve seen the last few years.
That notion reached its peak in last year’s NBA Finals when the Iowa native turned to a box-and-one defensive strategyusually seen in high school—as a means to defend Steph Curry. The two-time MVP called it janky, and it worked to great effect.
How was Nurse going to follow that up?
Toronto’s defence has been stellar all season, and Nurse’s creativity and flexibility is a major reason why. His willingness to employ variations of zone defence, man-to-man, full-court presses, and a touch of box-and-one has seen the Raptors allow the second-fewest points per-100 possessions at 105.5 behind the Milwaukee Bucks (102.3), per Cleaning the Glass.
Going back to that West Coast trip, Toronto held LeBron James, Kawhi Leonard, and Damian Lillard to 9-of-38 (23.7 percent) shooting from the field, while Leonard additionally also had a career-worst nine turnovers. The Raptors also famously limited Joel Embiid to zero points but the strategy that perhaps received the most attention came against the man who has led the league in scoring the last two seasons and was on pace to do it again: James Harden.
Entering that game, Harden was averaging 39.5 points per game and was generating buzz that he could average 40 for an entire season. Nurse turned to a full-court press that immediately morphed into a double-team the second Harden crossed half-court. Harden was limited to just six field-goal attempts and two free-throw attempts in the first half, but outlier performances from his teammates meant the Raptors ultimately lost the game.
Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and Warriors head coach Steve Kerr would later use the same strategy against the Rockets in a win.
Figuring Out Good Teams
If there is something that analysts will look to criticize with the Raptors, it’s their 11-14 record against plus-.500 teams. While Toronto has cruised to a 35-4 record against sub-.500 teams, people will say that they haven’t necessarily been a great team. Frankly, that speaks more to the injuries that the Raptors have had to cope with rather than the quality of the team.
In fact, at one point, Toronto was just 5-12 against plus-.500 teams, but have since won six of eight games as their roster stability improved, Siakam gradually grew more comfortable with being The Man, and Nurse understood which of the bench players he could actually trust.
They have earned statement wins against the Lakers, Celtics, 76ers, and Jazz, and unfortunately had the season cut short ahead of two big matchups with the Bucks. If someone is looking to hold the Raptors’ record against plus-.500 teams against Nurse, it just doesn’t hold anymore.