Bucks

Don Nelson, the second-winningest coach in NBA history who won five championships as a player with the Boston Celtics, died Sunday. He was 86.

Nelson’s death was announced by the Golden State Warriors, one of the teams he coached. They did not release details.

Nelson is one of two coaches in NBA history to have at least 250 wins with three different franchises — Milwaukee, Dallas and Golden State — also serving as general manager for all three franchises. He was a three-time coach of the year and made the playoffs 18 times in 31 seasons. He went to the conference finals three times with the Bucks and once with the Mavericks, never winning a title.

Nelson introduced what is now known as the point forward, and his up-tempo style of offense created a buzz. He said the idea of shifting from the dominant big men of the 1970s to an offense focused on speed and the fast break came from his playing days under Hall of Fame Celtics coach Red Auerbach.

The Celtics’ Don Nelson drives to the basket under pressure from Milwaukee’s Cornell Warner on May 12, 1974, in Milwaukee.

(Associated Press)

“The league really hadn’t seen an offense like the one we were running, and the results were undeniable,” Nelson wrote in 2016 in the Players’ Tribune.

Nelson said that “without Red Auerbach teaching me the mechanics of running the fast break, none of it would have been possible. He deserves all the credit for Nellie Ball, and for how fast the game of basketball is played today.”

Nelson played 11 of his 14 seasons in Boston and was on five Celtics championship teams under four different coaches. He became an assistant coach in Milwaukee after retiring as a player, then took over after coach Larry Costello resigned 18 games into the 1976-77 season. Nelson coached the Bucks for 11 seasons starting in 1976 and won seven straight division titles.

In Nelson’s second season, Milwaukee overcame a 29-point fourth quarter deficit to beat Atlanta 117-115 in regulation.

“I coached the team as though I was still playing for the Celtics, while implementing a few of my own strategies,” Nelson wrote. “I knew I wanted to play unconventional basketball and use speed to my advantage.”

His fast-paced offenses were probably best on display with Golden State in the “Run TMC” era featuring future Hall of Famers Tim Hardaway, Mitch Richmond and Chris Mullin. Nelson said he wanted them on the court at the same time.

Nelson spent 11 seasons over two stints with Golden State. The first one was punctuated by a rift with rookie star Chris Webber, who was traded away a month into his second season. Nelson, demoralized by the trade, missed nine games that season because of illness and resigned under pressure three months later in February 1995.

In between, Nelson was fired after less than one season in New York in 1995-96, then coached in Dallas for eight seasons, missing 21 games with the Mavericks starting in December 2000 to recuperate from prostate cancer surgery.

Nelson’s son, Donnie, joined his father as an assistant coach with the Mavericks in 1998, later became general manager and remained with the organization until 2021. Together they persuaded 20-year-old German star Dirk Nowitzki to pass up European basketball and join the Mavericks. Don Nelson also developed Steve Nash into one of the NBA’s top point guards before Nash went on to win back-to-back MVPs with the Phoenix Suns in 2005 and 2006.

Golden State Warriors coach Don Nelson celebrates with his team after breaking the record for NBA career coaching victories with a victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves on April 7, 2010, in Minneapolis. It was Nelson’s 1,333rd win.

(Paul Battaglia / Associated Press)

“Don Nelson was a true innovator whose influence on the game of basketball is still felt today,” current Warriors coach Steve Kerr said. “He consistently challenged conventional thinking, experimented with different lineups and styles of play and saw possibilities in the game that others often did not. So much of what is now commonplace in the modern NBA can be traced back to the way Nellie approached the game.”

At Golden State, Nelson’s “We Believe” Warriors led by Baron Davis upset Nowitzki and the top-seeded Mavericks in the first round of the 2007 playoffs in one of the biggest shockers in NBA history. In his final season as a coach, Nelson mentored rookie Stephen Curry in 2009-10.

“One of the big reasons I was drafted by the Warriors was because of Don Nelson. The story is he never liked rookies, but from Day 1 he challenged me and gave me an opportunity to be my best self on the court,” Curry said in a statement released by the Warriors. “He taught me a lot during our one season together and I’ll never forget the night he became the winningest coach in NBA history in Minnesota. We were so happy for him. He had an immeasurable impact on the sport and will go down as one of the greatest minds in the history of the game.”

Davis added: “When I think of Nellie, I’ll always think of the ‘We Believe’ team and our incredible run in 2007. He understood what made us go and made us believe we could beat anybody, ultimately helping us make history as the first No. 8 seed to defeat a No. 1 seed in a seven-game series. That time in my life and career was truly special, and Nellie was a huge part of making it possible.”

Don Nelson laughs while receiving the Chuck Daly Lifetime Achievement Award during a news conference on June 8, 2025, in Oklahoma City.

(Kyle Phillips / Associated Press)

Nelson retired as the NBA’s career coaching wins leader with 1,335, just ahead of Lenny Wilkens’ 1,332. Nelson kept that top spot for nearly 12 years before close friend and now-retired San Antonio coach Gregg Popovich passed him in March 2022.

Nelson was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2012. In 2025 he received the Chuck Daly Lifetime Achievement Award, presented by the National Basketball Coaches Assn. Miffed that the Mavericks sent Luka Doncic to the Lakers in a blockbuster trade, Nelson wore a pair of Doncic’s signature Jordan Brand sneakers to the awards ceremony. He called the trade a “tremendous mistake.”

Born in Muskegon, Mich., Nelson attended high school in Rock Island, Ill., and averaged a double-double in college at Iowa. He spent his retirement years living on the Hawaiian island of Maui and owned several short-term rentals on the island.

MIAMI — Giannis Antetokounmpo wants more championships. So do the Miami Heat.

And the Heat finally have another superstar.

Ending a marathon watch for the next great Miami get, the Heat landed Antetokounmpo — a two-time NBA MVP and 10-time All-Star — from the Milwaukee Bucks on Monday night in exchange for a massive haul of players and draft picks.

The terms, according to a person who spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the move has yet to receive the required league approval: Antetokounmpo and Bobby Portis are heading to Miami for Wisconsin native Tyler Herro, Jaime Jaquez Jr., Kel’el Ware and Kasparas Jakucionis. Milwaukee also gets at least four picks, including the No. 13 selection that will be made in Tuesday night’s NBA draft.

It ends a wild back-and-forth in the final days of the saga, with the Bucks considering offers from both Miami and Boston for Antetokounmpo — who led Milwaukee to the 2021 NBA title, was on the NBA’s 75th anniversary list of its greatest players ever, is a nine-time All-NBA selection and is coming off an injury-shortened season where he averaged 27.6 points per game.

There has been no secret that this is what Miami has sought, because this is what Miami usually seeks. The Heat pulled off similar moves by landing Shaquille O’Neal in 2004 (helping lead to the 2006 NBA title) and by getting LeBron James and Chris Bosh to play alongside Dwyane Wade in 2010 (leading to four NBA Finals runs in four seasons together, along with the 2012 and 2013 NBA titles).

Now, it’s Antetokounmpo’s turn. At 31, the Heat clearly believe he still has many good years left — and it’s generally presumed that by making this deal they’ll give the Greek superstar a massive extension later this year.

He was a perennial MVP candidate in Milwaukee, getting votes for that award in nine consecutive seasons before 2025-26, when too many missed games left him ineligible.

He has averaged 24.1 points and 9.9 rebounds per game in his career, with 10 consecutive seasons of averaging at least 22.9 points — with three years in there of averaging more than 30 points per game.

Only seven current players have more points in their careers than Antetokounmpo, who has totaled 21,531 to this point.

Antetokounmpo had been mentioned in trade talks countless times in recent years, with the Bucks always insisting — with words and actions — that they had no interest in trading their best player and one of the best players in the history of their franchise.

But this time, it seemed different.

The Bucks, who fired Doc Rivers as coach after the season, don’t have a roster that would be considered a championship contender. By trading Antetokounmpo, they can essentially start over with four players (and the Heat were high on all of them) along with draft capital.

“I just think before the draft is a natural time, right, because if Giannis does play somewhere else we’re going to get a lot of assets. … You’ve got to get it right,” Bucks co-owner Jimmy Haslam said in May, when the team introduced new coach Taylor Jenkins — who was told that Antetokounmpo may or may not be with the franchise when next season starts.

Jenkins and the rest of the NBA now has the answer: Antetokounmpo won’t be there.

Antetokounmpo had spoken highly of Miami many times over the years, even when the Heat and Bucks were going head-to-head in the playoffs. He also shares an agent with Heat star center Bam Adebayo, who was the only player that Miami clearly was not willing to part with in order to make this deal happen.

“They’re going to play tough and they’re not going to stop playing,” Antetokounmpo said after Milwaukee played Miami on March 12. “That’s the Miami Heat culture.”

Little did anyone know that night that those words were coming after what would be the next-to-last game for Antetokounmpo in a Bucks uniform. He played three nights later against Indiana, then was held out of Milwaukee’s final 15 games of the season.

The Bucks said that was for injury-related reasons. Antetokounmpo said he wanted to play.

He had some bouts with injury this past season: Antetokounmpo missed four games in late November with a left adductor strain and sat out eight games in December with a right calf strain, then he injured the right calf again in January.

He landed awkwardly on a dunk in that March 15 victory over Indiana and didn’t play again because of what team officials had labeled as a left knee hyperextension and bone bruise. Antetokounmpo said the last few weeks of the season that he was healthy and wanted to play, a dispute that resulted in an investigation by the league office.

Reynolds writes for the Associated Press.