Thunderous Intentions
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Grading Mark Daigneault two years into his OKC Thunder tenure

By Rylan Stiles

Head coach Mark Daigneault of Oklahoma City Thunder looks on during against the Chicago Bulls at United Center on February 12, 2022 in Chicago, Illinois. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by Quinn Harris/Getty Images)
Head coach Mark Daigneault of Oklahoma City Thunder looks on during against the Chicago Bulls at United Center on February 12, 2022 in Chicago, Illinois. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by Quinn Harris/Getty Images) /
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The OKC Thunder embark on year three of Mark Daigneault’s tenure in Bricktown. You could call Mark Daigneault the perfect head coach for Sam Presti, a mystery man as far as NBA coaches go with a grasp on how the team has to operate to get back to being perennial title contenders. How mysterious is Daigneault? Well, his Birthday is wrong on Wikipedia, no one knows exactly how old he is, no one knows his salary or contract length, and there is even still dispute on how to say his name.

When Billy Donovan and Sam Presti shared a few cold beverages following the NBA Bubble and elected to part ways as Donovan was off to the windy city, the coaching search drug on and took many twists and turns before landing a head ball coach just seven days before the 2020 NBA Draft due to the condensed offseason schedule following the NBA Bubble. That head coach was of course Mark Daigneault who spent time coaching the Thunder’s G-League team, the OKC Blue, before joining Donovan’s staff at the NBA level. Both with the strong University of Florida ties the duo had a good relationship, and having spent years within the Thunder franchise, the transition was nearly seamless…outside of that whole pandemic season thing featuring no fans in the Paycom Center for the first year of his career.

Grading Mark Daigneault’s first two season’s with the OKC Thunder

Mark Daigneault not only had ties to Donovan but being from Massachusetts gave him some reliability to Sam Presti. After just one year as an NBA assistant, Mark Daigneault began his coaching career with a 22-50 record in 2020-21 and followed it up with a two-win improvement in ten more games in 2021-22 for a 24-58 record.

Sadly for Mark Daigneault, he will not have the fast start record-wise as the former OKC Thunder coaches like Scott Brooks and Billy Donovan, that is due to the nature of the organization tanking or better draft selections trying to build a championship contender.

Though, if you can look past his record, Mark Daigneault has shown elite coaching chops that Brooks and Donovan did not. Even without the luxury of coaching Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, and other future Hall of Famers.

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