Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Team confirms Spoelstra got contract extension
BOSTON -- The security was granted well in advance of the Miami Heat’s current growing pains. Erik Spoelstra, the team confirmed, has been coaching on a contract extended during the offseason.
With no formal team announcement made either when the agreement was reached or at the start of the season, the team responded to media requests with confirmation that Spoelstra’s contract runs beyond this season.
Spoelstra issued a statement through the team prior to Friday night’s game against the Boston Celtics at TD Garden, thanking owner Micky Arison and Heat President Pat Riley for the previously signed extension.
“I would like to thank the Arisons and Pat for their continued confidence in me and my staff and are humbled in their trust in me as head coach,” he said. “It has been an incredible 22 years being part of the Miami Heat family and we will look to continue our goal of winning NBA championships.”
Spoelstra, 46, in his ninth season as an NBA head coach, all with the Heat, guided the Heat to four consecutive NBA Finals from 2011 to 2014, with championships in 2012 and ’13.
He is the NBA’s secondlongest-tenured coach, behind only the San Antonio Spurs’ Gregg Popovich.
The Heat, though, have fallen on harder times since the free-agency departure of LeBron James in the 2014 offseason and then with the blood clots that have sidelined Chris Bosh.
Since that appearance in the 2014 Finals, the Heat failed to make the playoffs in 2015, advanced within one victory of the 2016 Eastern Conference finals and now appear headed to just the second lottery finish in Spoelstra’s coaching career.
The Heat, who took a 10-23 record into Friday’s game, are on pace for Spoelstra’s worst finish. His lone previous team to finish below .500 was the 2014-15 team that went 37-45, the season when Bosh first was lost to blood clots.
Spoelstra, though, said he’s seen enough turnaround through his years with the team to embrace this latest challenge.
“Ultimately this is the profession that I’m grateful and humbled to be a part of,” he said, “and, more importantly, to be a part of this organization, that has those kind of expectations and standards every year. And so whatever word you want to use, we’ve had to do it before, several times — retool, rebuild — and we’ve done it quicker than most.”
Spoelstra’s influence within the organization has grown in recent years, including increased input on personnel decisions, an element that was included in his previous contract. He also has reshaped his coaching staff, with all four of his assistants his own hires.
The Heat declined to offer the terms of Spoelstra’s extension.
“I’m invigorated by it, regardless of what the record is, that we’re able to step back with perspective and how we look at the big picture,” he said.
Riley said in July that the agreement on a Spoelstra extension was a formality.
“The last couple of years, there’s been some of the rebuilding process and retooling to where we are today,” Riley said. “He’s got his work cut out for him. Welcome to being an NBA coach. It’s not always going to be easy and sometimes there are going to be other challenges.”
Riley said he remained committed to Spoelstra’s possibilities.
“His philosophy,” Riley said, “as coach to me is, ‘Bring them to me and I’ll coach them.’ That’s it. That’s the way it has to be right now. He’s very involved in the process all the time. Every single player that we talk about or sign, he gives the nod because I don’t want to send him anybody that he doesn’t want.”
Spoelstra stressed Friday that he is taking none of this for granted.
“I’ve been fortunate enough,” Spoelstra said, “to be with the Miami Heat long enough to understand that we’re always trying to put together a team that will compete for an NBA title.”