Everything changed for the NBA, and the world at large, on March 11, 2020. The Warriors that morning decided they'd play their home game against the Brooklyn Nets scheduled for March 12th without any fans at Chase Center after San Francisco Mayor London Breed banned gatherings of over 1,000 people. Then that same night, Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert tested positive for COVID-19.
An hour later it was announced the 2019-20 NBA season would be suspended for the foreseeable future. Vince Carter’s 22-year career run came to an end that night. A new chapter also began for Warriors coach Steve Kerr and son Nicholas, who at the time was an assistant on his father’s staff.
All three of Kerr’s kids – sons Nicholas and Matthew, and daughter Madeline – moved into Steve’s San Diego home with their significant others. The family lived together during the pandemic for about four months. Steve remembers a lot of memorable dinners and conversations he doesn’t get to always enjoy as the world pressed pause. It also was a time for he and Nicholas to prepare for the 2020 NBA Draft, grinding tape with the Warriors being rewarded the No. 2 overall pick in late August.
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Nicholas now is entering his second season as the head coach of the Warriors’ G League affiliate in Santa Cruz, and though he spent three seasons in Golden State’s video department and rose as a player development coach, the isolation of the pandemic was the most the two have talked about basketball and coaching philosophy. They’re father and son first. Basketball always will come second.
But advice was given from a father seeing his ultra-nervous son about to step into a new reality and a larger spotlight ahead of his first game as a head coach. The moment could have been a time for Kerr to get deep, imparting some kind of spiritual wisdom. He could have been corny finding the right words straight from a Hollywood script. As he often does, Kerr chose sarcasm to loosen the anxiety of his son.
“That was probably the one time that he talked about coaching,” Nicholas remembers in an exclusive interview with NBC Sports Bay Area. “He said, ‘Don’t worry. You’re going to stand up there having an idea of what’s going on and what you need to do, and then you’re going to realize that the players decided what happens anyway.
‘Unfortunately for you, you don’t have Steph [Curry] for your first game.’”
Golden State Warriors
Reminded of his enlightening counsel, Kerr cracked up at getting a smile and laugh out of his son before taking the court at Kaiser Permanente Arena against the Stockton Kings. Curry scored a game-high 24 points in the elder Kerr’s coaching debut. Luckily for Nicholas, he had Brandin Podziemski (24 points) and Trayce Jackson-Davis (28 points), who combined to score 52 points.
Each Kerr came out on the winning side of things.
Players celebrated Nicholas with an onslaught of water bottles being poured on him in the locker room after the win while he still was in his coaching sweatsuit. Then, Steve and his wife Margot peered in to watch what the Warriors coach has done countless times for more than a decade now, answering questions from the media.
“We were incredibly proud,” Steve says. “I knew how nervous he was. It was an incredible night for all of us.”
Neither Steve nor Nicholas have denied nepotism has played a part in the Sea Dubs’ head coach starting his coaching path in San Antonio, a franchise his father played for twice and won two titles with – first in 1999 and then in his final season in 2003. Nicholas played collegiately at the University of San Diego and at Cal, where he also was a graduate assistant for one season.
The two also aren’t naive to the situation. There’s another side to Nicholas’ work with both Golden State and Santa Cruz, too. His father has embraced learning more and more from the analytically inclined younger coaches.
“The younger guys have a greater education in analytics and modern trends with what’s happening around the league,” he said. “He and our other guys, [head video coordinator] Lainn Wilson, [assistant director of player development] Will Sheehey, these guys are great resources. I’m frequently asking questions of them.
“They have a different viewpoint than the old guys and it’s important. The game’s always changing, so it’s important for us to change with it, or hopefully stay ahead, and I know the way to do that is to talk to the young guys.”
So, what are the biggest differences and similarities between the two? The obvious first stood out for two former Warriors who were on two-way contracts last season, playing for both Kerrs as they bounced between the G League and NBA.
“They look alike,” Usman Garuba said. “They look very alike, yeah.”
Lester Quinones saw a more passive coach in Nicholas compared to Steve. He even suggested he had to tell his coach to get on him more, a notion when told of Quinones’ side of things made Nicholas laugh from his own memories of having to lay into the now Philadelphia 76er more than once. But being around both Steve and Nicholas, the 2022-23 G League Most Improved Player saw the many ways in which they’re alike as coaches.
“I'm excited to see what he's going to do with this coaching stuff, because he definitely has the ability to be a great coach,” Quinones said.
Santa Cruz reached the second round of the G League playoffs last season, and Garuba was shocked it was Nicholas’ first as a head coach, having thought he had many more years of experience despite his young age. He commended him for the individual attention he gave him, especially breaking down film.
Though Garuba only played six games for the big team, the Warriors have put a major emphasis the last two years on having Golden State and Santa Cruz on the same page to have players ready to step in at the NBA level when needed.
“He taught me a lot of things,” Garuba said. “He made me work on my game, and being able to try to play like, you know, as similar as the Golden State Warriors play there in Santa Cruz. And it was a fun year down in Santa Cruz. Every guy I played with that year, we had fun, and that's something important at the end of the day.”
The idea of individual film sessions didn’t just happen for Garuba, of course. Kerr made it a point in Santa Cruz for each member of his coaching staff to find time to fire up the tape for each player. Coaches rotated throughout the years, focusing on different positions to build trust and relationships with each player. That right there is a Kerr staple.
Trust. Steve learned it from the greats like Lute Olsen in college to his NBA career under Phil Jackson, Gregg Popovich and other legends of the game. Nicholas didn’t want players thinking only one coach was giving them individual time, but that each had their ears and eyes open to making them better helping them on their own path to the NBA.
Both positive and negative examples were shown. For every negative, however, there was always a positive. Another Kerr staple.
“Sometimes for us, it applies to Golden State,” Nicholas explains. “But I think that was probably more of a big picture, philosophical thing of value. How the team played, how we tried to build out the offensive and defensive concepts of if Golden State had three injuries and had to call you up tomorrow. That was kind of the goal.
“I think that’s the goal of every G League organization. We can’t match it entirely, so we end up running a few different plays and we have some different spacing concepts, but things that apply still apply to Golden State. It becomes easier for the guys.”
Playing a game of compare and contrast between father and son sounds easy on the surface. Following the footsteps of a future Hall of Famer who has won nine rings between playing and coaching can also be a burden for a son.
Yet, he doesn’t shy away from mimicking the principles of joy, mindfulness, compassion and competitiveness from a personal and basketball standpoint that have been invaluable to the Warriors’ success.
“You can say that to your team and hope that it sticks, but to be honest, joy is created from your group,” he said. “It’s not created from your head coach and your assistants. You’re relying on hoping your players all like each other and all like playing with each other. We had a really fun, competitive group that made every day so much fun to get to work with everybody.”
As Nicholas embarks on his second season leading Santa Cruz after an offseason spent with Team USA basketball and the Golden State Warriors, with the regular-season opener being at home Friday night against the Valley Sun, one day before his 32nd birthday, he won’t have the luxury of a Warriors first-round draft pick like Podziemski.
His roster is an eclectic one that features the Warriors’ 2024 second-round pick Quinten Post looking to develop into an NBA player, as well as former touted New York Knicks top pick Kevin Knox and many others trying to show they belong at the highest level of basketball.
In helping them get there and also finding ways to win G League games, Nicholas turns to the same core values his father teaches on a daily basis, starting with joy but understanding who’s the real chef of that creation, empowering his players at every opportunity.
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