Sacramento Kings head coach Mike Brown has been named NBA Coach of the Year, the league announced on Wednesday (April 19). He received all 100 first-place votes, becoming the first coach to ever win the award unanimously.
Brown’s award follows Kings guard De’Aaron Fox, who won the Jerry West Clutch Player of the Year award on Tuesday. After not winning any individual awards in 13 years, Sacramento has picked up two in as many days.
The 2022-23 NBA Coach of the Year is… Mike Brown!#NBAAwards pic.twitter.com/lfXRzLlHj7
— NBA (@NBA) April 19, 2023
Breaking streaks has been the theme of the Kings’ season, as they made the playoffs for the first time since 2006, snapped a run of 16 consecutive losing seasons and won a division title for the first time in 20 years all in Brown’s first season at the helm. They boast the league’s best offense (120.7 points per game) and the West’s best road record (25-16), cruising to the third seed in the conference. They also have a 2-0 series lead over the defending-champion Warriors in the first round of the playoffs, something that has never been done in Golden State head coach Steve Kerr’s time with the team.
This is Brown’s second Coach of the Year award, as he previously won in 2009 after leading the Cavaliers to the league’s best record. He easily beat out the other finalists — Oklahoma City‘s Mark Daigneault and Boston’s Joe Mazzulla — becoming the 11th person to win the award more than once.
Before Sacramento, Brown had a couple bad runs with teams, getting fired by the Lakers just five games into his second season there and by the Cavaliers after one season in his second stint with the team. He became a Warriors assistant under Kerr after his struggles then left for the Kings last offseason.
Mike Brown has had a really dope career pic.twitter.com/U3p20FDXoV
— Brett Usher (@UsherNBA) April 18, 2023
Brown, Fox and Grizzlies forward Jaren Jackson Jr. — who won Defensive Player of the Year on Monday — have already taken home three of this season’s major individual awards. The NBA will announce its Sixth Man of the Year on Thursday.
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