OKC Thunder: Nurse wins Coach of Year, Donovan third -top 3 by the numbers

OKC Thunder head coach Billy Donovan finishes third in the media Coach of the Year voting. Here’s the tale of the tape, based on results and stats.

The NBA announced the first individual award on Saturday with Raptors head coach Nick Nurse winning Coach of the Year. OKC Thunder head coach, Billy Donovan was third in the voting.

Former OKC Thunder assistant Adrian Griffin is a member of his staff. Recently, Nurse stepped aside during a nationally televised seeding game to allow Griffin to function in his stead in order to garner some attention and help him in his efforts to ascend to a head coaching role.

OKC Thunder bench boss Billy Donovan and Bucks head man Mike Budenholzer were the co-winners of the award that was voted on by their peers. In this media voted award they finished third and second respectively.

This season there were a number of coaches who merited consideration including Erik Spoelstra of the Heat, Nate McMillan of the Pacers, and Taylor Jenkins of the Grizzlies to name a few.

For those wondering what types of things the media might have considered when voting here’s a quick primer on the top three vote recipients:

2019-20 NBA Coach of the Year:

Nick Nurse

His selection wasn’t surprising in the least although Billy Donovan should’ve been second (in my humble opinion).  Nurse received 90 of the 100 votes for first place and the TNT crew did a solid having his high school coach present him (virtually) with the award.

Here’s why Nurse won so convincingly.

The Raptors finished this season in precisely the same position – second in the East, second overall. That point was pivotal with voters since the Raptors lost both their NBA finals MVP (Kawhi Leonard) and starting shooting guard (Danny Green) in free agency.

While the Thunder got All-Star Chris Paul and a load of draft picks the Raptors got nothing in return for their two starters and the player who essentially replaced Leonard was Rondae Hollis-Jefferson, though the reality is Nurse gave Pascal Siakam, Kyle Lowry and Fred VanVleet the shots and responsibilities of the exiting duo.

However, what made this story more compelling is how they improved despite these losses. For example, the Raptors improved their defensive rank this season, had a better win percentage through the same number of games played, and did it all while copying with massive man-games lost due to injury.

Case in point — of the Raptors starters only OG Anunoby avoided the injury curse of missing 11 or more games. Perhaps his appendix that burst just before the playoffs last season and then got infected is why he got good fortune this year.

Moreover, the next three players on the depth chart also missed games. Of their best players ranking one through eight (excluding OG) each of them missed between11 and 28 games for a total of 219 man-games lost. Only the Blazers of the playoff seeds had more lost games due to injury and the other teams who were in this range are all lottery teams.

Nurse is a savant when it comes to defensive strategy and arguably the very best at in-game adjustments. His squad utilizes different defensive schemes and used them throughout the season as his thinking is to practice something even at the expense of losing during the season so the club is prepared to put the scheme into a playoff game.

Watch a Raptors game and at any time Nurse will yell out a few words and ‘snap’ the unit on the floor smoothly adjusts to a two-three zone or box plus one. This had the Raptors leading several defensive categories in the regular season such as:

• Best opponent points per game
• Best perimeter defense
• Second, for opponent points scored in the paint
• Second at forcing turnovers

Offensively while the team failed to make the top 10 much of that had to do with the injuries. Now that the team is healthy the seeding games and playoffs are a closer representation of what the club can do.

They rank second offensively in the playoffs and are hitting the 3-ball at the fourth-best clip (41.9%) with every single starter capable of hitting the 3-point shot at a high clip.

They are the top-ranked team at scoring in the fast break and second in points scored off turnovers.

Although Nurse has his team key in on protecting the paint the fact they also excel at defending the perimeter speaks to their versatility and his defensive schemes.

In season the Raptors ranked fourth in net differential but in the playoffs, they are head and shoulders ahead of all teams with a plus 18.5 differential.

Whether the Raptors end up defending their title or getting the opportunity this award was well deserved.