Spurs head coach Mitch Johnson is December’s Coach of the Month in the Western Conference, while Joe Mazzulla of the Celtics is the Eastern Conference recipient of the award, the NBA announced today (Twitter link).
Johnson guided the Spurs to an 11-3 record in December, not including the NBA Cup final, which doesn’t count toward the regular season standings. San Antonio’s big month, which included three separate victories over the defending champion Thunder, occurred despite Victor Wembanyama and Stephon Castle each missing multiple games due to injuries.
In addition to posting the NBA’s best record for the month, the Spurs also had the fifth-best offensive rating (118.9) and sixth-ranked defensive rating (112.0), which helped earn Johnson Coach of the Month recognition over fellow nominees David Adelman (Nuggets), Mark Daigneault (Thunder), and Chris Finch (Timberwolves), per the league (Twitter link).
As for Mazzulla’s Celtics, they ranked eighth in the East entering December, but finished the month as the No. 3 seed in the conference after going 9-3.
Even without perennial All-NBA forward Jayson Tatum, Boston had the NBA’s best offensive rating (124.3) and second-best net rating (+11.0) in December en route to wins over the Knicks, Lakers, and Raptors (twice), among others.
J.B. Bickerstaff of the Pistons, Mike Brown of the Knicks, and Jordi Fernandez of the Nets were also nominated for the award.
Daigneault and Bickerstaff earned the monthly honor for games played in October and November.
Mazzulla keeps this up he’ll be coach of the year.
Celtics are playing man. Coach definitely deserves credit.
People dislike Coach Mazzulla and I don’t get it. He’s a great coach.
Celtics are still on pace for 50+ wins in a season that they’re were supposed to tank and retool.
I am so impressed by how well they are playing.
I thought they should have been too good to tank.
I was thinking their record would be around 500.
And I was hoping Brown would really perform well. But I didn’t think that he and they would play this well.
Mitch has done a nice job but issues w Spurs are becoming clear. Teams have figured out their guards can’t shoot and are just protecting the rim which negates much of what Castle are Harper can do. This is compounded because their stretch guys – Barnes and Champagnie can’t make an open 3. Yes Champagnie hit 11 the other night – but followed that with a 1-7, which is more his norm. The surprise is Harrison Barnes has just been horrible and they need to move on from him. They need to make a trade for a legit three point shooter – ideally a stretch 4.
This has been especially evident w Vassell out – and when Wemby is out they are really in trouble