COACH’S CORNER
Canada’s short-handed national basketball team says Nick Nurse has a knack for getting the most out of them — while having fun along the way,
Watch Nick Nurse in the throes of a unique summer job, patrolling the sidelines in his Canada hoodie or shooting shirt and doing what he does.
Exhorting here and there, a quick hand slap to a player leaving the game for a job well done, a fast aside to an official about some call made or missed.
Always working but seemingly always relaxed, as comfortable leading a bunch of players he barely knows in an international exhibition as he was in games for the highest NBA stakes.
Unruffled, unperturbed, loving every minute of it as the head coach of Canada’s senior men’s team that returns to the biggest international stage next week for the first time since 2010 — at the FIBA World Cup in China.
In a private moment, it’s pointed out to the 52-year-old Toronto Raptors head coach that he seems to be getting a charge out of a return to the world scene, and he’s quick to agree.
“I love coaching these guys, man,” he said relatively early in the process.
Nurse got the job — which is currently for this summer and through the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, if Canada can capture a Games berth — under somewhat unusual circumstances.
Senior team general manager Rowan Barrett had originally said he was hoping for an accelerated process after former coach Jay Triano took his name out of consideration for a job he’d held since 2012. Barrett initially said it would be a matter of weeks before the important job was filled — a rather odd pronouncement that cast a limited net over the world of candidates.
Barrett and Canada Basketball officials saw the folly of the original statement because so many candidates made their interest known. They ended up with Nurse, as accomplished a head coach as they could possibly have hired.
And given the high-pressure, intense basketball and the monstrous stakes for Canada heading into the World Cup, his personality seems a near-perfect fit.
The best thing the team has going for it now is a coach with something of a devilmay-care attitude, the possessor of a refreshing belief that things are going to work out and they’ll find a way to do the things they need to do. It resonates with the players.
“He’s got a really good attitude, he knows his stuff and I think he brings really positive energy to the team,” guard Phil Scrubb said early in the international season.
Nurse’s energy will go a long way toward helping Canada overcome what can be seen as a talent deficit in a firstround group that includes perennial medal contenders Lithuania and Australia, along with Senegal.
The coach’s creativity and ability to move from one task to the next, regardless of how the previous one turned out, permeates the roster. You don’t see the coach get upset, you don’t see the players get upset.
“He’s got a really good attitude, he knows his stuff and I think he brings really positive energy to the team.” PHIL SCRUBB TEAM CANADA GUARD
Nurse experiments and the players believe he’ll find the right formula. Of all the key things that have happened in the abbreviated season, the way the disparate group has come together might be the most important.
“He knows how to get the most out of us,” veteran forward Melvin Ejim said.
Nurse has been digging deep into his bag of tricks to give Canada an edge, never more so than in an OT win over New Zealand on Wednesday in Sydney. He called two late-game plays that he’d used before with the Raptors but likely caught his entire roster by surprise:
On one side inbounds play, he had four players stretched across the court and set them all in motion before the ball was put back into play — a breakout style he got from studying pre-snap CFL player movement. It ended with a wellstructured high pick-and-roll that ended with a shot at the rim, which was blocked.
Seconds later, Canada ran a Nurse favourite. With the ball out of bounds about midcourt, Canada had one player isolate on the ball side and three others lined up along the free-throw line on the opposite side of court. With many expecting the ball to go to the isolated forward, the ball went from midcourt diagonally into the far corner, where centre Kyle Wiltjer had stepped back beyond the three-point line. He missed the wide-open shot — much the same way Marc Gasol did the only time Nurse had the Raptors run it.
Those are the kinds of innovative tactics that give the players an even greater appreciation for the coach, and a belief in what they’re doing. “You gotta have fun, man,” Nurse said. An attitude that may give Canada an edge when it’s most needed.