Nick Nurse is officially a free agent on the coaching market, and the Rockets have been the most hotly linked team to pick the former Coach of the Year up.
Speculation of Nurse headed to Houston has been growing for a while. Even before his dismissal, The Athletic's Shams Charania was reporting that Nurse was "believed to be a top target" for the team. He's now expected to be interviewed, per ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski.
Aside from the obvious vacancy created by moving on from Stephen Silas at the end of the season, what is the cause for the Nurse-Rockets speculation?
MORE: Why the Raptors fired Nick Nurse as head coach
Nick Nurse's success with the Rio Grande Valley Vipers and relationship with Rafael Stone
Rafael Stone, the general manager of the Rockets since 2020, first joined the organization in 2005.
Nurse was hired by the Rockets to coach their G League team, the Rio Grande Valley Vipers, in 2011. Prior to joining the Rockets organization, he had already been wildly successful in the G League, winning Coach of the Year honors and a championship during the 2010-11 season with the Iowa Energy. He won a championship in his second season with the Vipers, then departed to join the Raptors as an assistant coach.
The Rockets are heavily involved in the operations of their G League organization. Stone and Nurse both worked for the Rockets during those two years.
Nick Nurse's fit with the Rockets
The Rockets seem to really want Nurse. But would Nurse want the job?
Stone outlined what he expected from the next Rockets coach in his end-of-season press conference.
"We want someone who has a real vision for how to implement our young guys, how to incorporate some veterans," Stone said.
The Rockets have a ton of young players on their roster. The average age of their roster was 24.3 years old, making them one of the youngest teams in the league. Whoever takes over for Silas is going to have to focus heavily on player development for a losing team.
Nurse may have better options available to him. On April 17, Marc Stein of The Stein Line speculated that he was hearing "pessimism" regarding Nurse landing in Houston. "Perhaps Nurse has other options that are not plainly apparent," Stein wrote.
Adrian Griffin, Ime Udoka and Kenny Atkinson among many other Rockets coaching candidates
The Rockets are notorious among the league for interviewing a massive amount of candidates during their coaching searches. That appears to be no different in this search.
The list includes:
- Raptors assistant Adrian Griffin, as reported by Charania
- Longtime Rockets assistant Sam Cassell, as reported by Kelly Iko
- Ime Udoka, as reported by Iko
- Suns assistant Kevin Young, as reported by Iko
- James Borrego, as reported by Sports Radio 610
- Frank Vogel, as reported by Iko
- Kenny Atkinson, as reported by ESPN
Wojnarowski has reported that they are closing in on a second round of interviews, which are expected to include Udoka, Vogel and Nurse.
