Damon Stoudamire

[Augusta_Jacket]

Lot's of smoke building here...

Georgia Tech in talks with Celtics' Damon Stoudamire

Stoudamire joined the Celtics in 2021 after five seasons as head coach at Pacific.

theathletic.com

Report: Georgia Tech hiring Damon Stoudamire as head coach

The Boston Celtics appear to be losing a top assistant coach

www.celticsblog.com

 

[Augusta_Jacket]

Sources: Ga. Tech finalizing hire of Stoudamire

The Yellow Jackets are finalizing a deal to name Celtics assistant Damon Stoudamire the program's new coach, sources told ESPN. A former NBA player and college head coach, Stoudamire has been in Boston for the past two seasons.

www.espn.com

 

[Hjacket]

Worked for Josh at Memphis, I believe. He was on no list of suspects that I ever saw. This is definitely not a ho hum hire.

 

[EddieK]

I like the hire

 

[Silk3]

Love it

 

[Ramble1885]

Seems like a solid hire. Not much experience as a college head coach but he did a decent job turning around one of the toughest jobs in basketball which is Pacific. Currently (i say currently bc no official GT release YET) he’s on the staff of the Celtics who are one of the best NBA teams right now. Plus his long NBA career as well. Could go well for us.

 

[bke1984]

Kind of curious hire. His record at Pacific was pretty bad overall. He had three bad years, one good year, and one average partial year during the pandemic. I'm not sure I'd call that "turning Pacific around." In fact, it's very close to what Josh did with us. We'll see...

 

[Silk3]

Was with Mazulla and Udoka last 2 years

 

[Ramble1885]

Kind of curious hire. His record at Pacific was pretty bad overall. He had three bad years, one good year, and one average partial year during the pandemic. I'm not sure I'd call that "turning Pacific around." In fact, it's very close to what Josh did with us. We'll see...

They went 8-20 before he was hired. Since legendary coach Bob Thomason retired in in 2013 Pacific has only had two winning seasons. Stoudamire is responsible for one of them.

 

[kg01]

Kind of curious hire. His record at Pacific was pretty bad overall. He had three bad years, one good year, and one average partial year during the pandemic. I'm not sure I'd call that "turning Pacific around." In fact, it's very close to what Josh did with us. We'll see...

Pacific is a bad job. I imagine you gotta take results there with a major grain of salt.

I'm working to being good on this. I don't like NBA guys coaching, seems to rarely work well.

On the good side, I do believe this will send reverberations through the landscape in a good way. I can't name a guy from the selltics recent coaching group that's not done well upon leaving. Lastly, the most recent batch of NBA guys are doing well at their current places so maybe im jaded unfairly.

This could be really good for us.

 

[leatherneckjacket]

Kind of curious hire. His record at Pacific was pretty bad overall. He had three bad years, one good year, and one average partial year during the pandemic. I'm not sure I'd call that "turning Pacific around." In fact, it's very close to what Josh did with us. We'll see...

Pacific fired their previous coach for violations and was coming off NCAA sanctions. Turning that team around in four years in that conference is impressive.

 

[Tech93]

Interesting hire, didn’t see this coming. Can’t say I’m super excited about the hire. Time will tell.

 

[mkemkay]

I'm cautiously optimistic. With greater context around Pacific, it feels like he turned a dire program around. Based on Celtic fan reactions, he's highly regarded and not a courtesy hire. His name recognition and experience in the NBA will appeal to the upper tier talent we need to get back to competitive.

 

[brian22]

I’m curious how this came together so quickly. Why is this guy head and shoulders above the rest? I’m optimistic and J Batt has my trust, but I want to know why this guy was undoubtedly our choice.

 

[Augusta_Jacket]

Celtics played in ATL Saturday. Most likely Stoudamire met with JBatt at some point while he was in town for the game. Amazing how quiet all this was kept.

 

[leatherneckjacket]

I’m curious how this came together so quickly. Why is this guy head and shoulders above the rest? I’m optimistic and J Batt has my trust, but I want to know why this guy was undoubtedly our choice.

I think this has been in the works for some time. I also think ADJB does not like to (nor want to) fight over coaches with other programs. By going with someone who is both unconventional and not on anyone else's list, he can negotiate against himself. He can also hire him right away, since he is not coaching elsewhere. That is huge since we are trying to keep the nucleus intact and convince Blue Cain to stay committed to Tech.

 

[slugboy]

If you haven’t seen it in the blaze of information going by today, the board is supposed to meet this afternoon.

Having watched Boston play the Atlanta Hawks this week, Boston is a ******* buzz saw. The NBA is a different beast, but if Staudamire can bring some of that here, I’ll be happy.

This seems like the kind of hire to raise eyebrows around our conference and others.

Complete speculation based on the rumors we’ve been hearing: 1) We had our primary candidates locked in, and they were in the NCAA tournament and we were waiting on them to free up; 2) we talked to Staudamire this weekend and it’s a done deal—>> This makes me think that we had candidates we liked lined up, and Staudamire’s agent reached out, and Batt sees this as a trade up, and he was opportunistically offered the job.

I think Batt is better at keeping track of donors. My guess is that everything is lined up before the board meeting today.

I also think Batt as a fundraiser sees Staudamire as someone he can raise funds and excitement around, and NIL should follow.

Celtics played in ATL Saturday. Most likely Stoudamire met with JBatt at some point while he was in town for the game. Amazing how quiet all this was kept.

That’s in some of the stories, such as the Athletic and ESPN.

I think this has been in the works for some time. I also think ADJB does not like to (nor want to) fight over coaches with other programs. By going with someone who is both unconventional and not on anyone else's list, he can negotiate against himself. He can also hire him right away, since he is not coaching elsewhere. That is huge since we are trying to keep the nucleus intact and convince Blue Cain to stay committed to Tech.

I think that this should help with transfers (we should only have transfers that don’t fit here). I hope it helps with Cain.

 

[glandon1960]

Interesting probable hire - some quick thoughts

1. AD appears to have had this one lined up before letting CJP go .... which a lot here stated, and I agreed, needed to be done (if you let CJP go now, you better have the replacement lined up)
2. Stoudamire's staff will be important - usually new coaches keep one of the current staff - and bring in the rest - hoping the budget is sufficient to get the stronger staff than CJP could afford with the budget - If hired this week, he has time to get those people in place by end of NCAA Tournament. No reason to believe the Celtics would not let him move on nearly immediately
3. NIL - AD needs to get that competitive and in next 12-18 months .... hear it's being work on, but NIL will effect how well any coach can recruit portal/HS these days. Did lack of NIL limit CJP - almost certainly ....
4. #1 job - retain the core of last years team ...... certainly Kelly, Deebo, Moore, Terry, Sturdivant, Smith, and keep Blue Cain's commitment ... not always easy to do, but seems to have track record/reputation where he could
5. #2 job - get pieces in place to build on last years team - i.e. couple bigs from portal that are capable of playing immediately - which is obvious to anyone here ... barring miraculous off season development, there are no starting ACC caliber centers on the roster right now
6. The Princeton offense is likely scrapped - look forward to seeing what he runs. And likely the 1-3-1 defense may be scrapped .... I don't mind that, but we were awful small at times to rebound out of it and many ACC teams have seen it enough to know how they want to attack it - just like all the teams knew how they wanted to attack the Syracuse zone (novelty has worn off)

Certainly a hire I would be happy with, that has chance to get GT hoops relevant again.

 

[kg01]

Celtics played in ATL Saturday. Most likely Stoudamire met with JBatt at some point while he was in town for the game. Amazing how quiet all this was kept.

That's why I kinda was wary about all the names folks put out once the firing was done. We all should have been.

 

[CuseJacket]

Speculating here...

Between Batt's experience with Oats and now hiring an NBA guy, we're going to take A LOT of 3's next year. And we kind of are set up to do that, assuming we return our roster (Deebo, Miles, Freds). Run two guys to the corners and play a 3-man game in the middle with heavy PnR.

Still need heady, steady PG play and a threat to score from that position, and it would be nice to have a rim-running C to go with it, or pick-and-pop. If we can get that C from the portal, or if Cyril makes a big leap, this could be fun.