An NBA coach is looking for a new team. On Friday, the Toronto Raptors announced that they have parted ways with Nick Nurse who was the team’s head coach for five seasons. This comes after the Raptors finished the 2022-23 season with a 41-41 record and lost to the Chicago Bulls in the first game of the Eastern Conference play-in tournament.
“The decision to make a change like this is never arrived at easily or taken lightly, especially when it comes to a person who has been an integral part of this franchise’s most historic accomplishments, and who has been a steady leader through some of our team’s most challenging times,” team president Masai Ujiri said in a statement Friday. “As we reflect on Nick’s many successes, we thank him and his family and wish them the best in future. This is an opportunity for us to reset, to refocus, to put into place the personnel and the players who will help us reach our goal of winning our next championship.”
Videos by PopCulture.com
Nurse, 55, was with the Raptors since 2013. He was an assistant coach for his first five years with the team before replacing Dwane Casey as the head coach. In his first season as head coach, Nurse led the Raptors to their first NBA Championship in team history. From there, Nurse’s run with the team was a mixed bag as they lost in the conference semifinals the following year and missed the playoffs twice in the next three years.
“To watch us play this year was not us,” Ujiri said Friday at his end-of-season news conference. “I did not enjoy watching this team play. I think that spoke loud and clear to everything that went on this year. It bothered all of us.”It bothered coach, too. But sometimes we have to make change and we have to move forward.”
According to ESPN, Nurse met with Ujiri several times in recent days before the decision was made Friday. Nurse had one year and more than $8 million left on his contract. ESPN also says that Ime Udoka is expected to be a top candidate to be the next head coach. Udoka was the head coach of the Boston Celtics but was suspended by the team before the start of the 2022-23 season for violating team rules.
