Few figures in basketball have a history as rich as Larry Brown’s. From Olympic gold to a respectable playing career as a point guard for North Carolina and in the ABA to 14 coaching stops at some of the NCAA’s most esteemed programs and on NBA teams like the mid-90s Pacers, the Allen Iverson-era Sixer, and the champion Pistons of the early 2000s, the Brooklyn native and Hall of Famer has done it all.
I recently spoke to Brown by phone from his office in Dallas, where he currently coaches the Southern Methodist University Mustangs. In this winding conversation, we talk about the changing landscape of college hoops, Andrew Wiggins, forgotten stars of the ABA and Brown’s dream job.
SN: It’s been nearly thirty years since you last coached in the college ranks. What changes have you noticed?
LB: The last time I coached college was 1988, at Kansas. I’d say that recruiting is certainly different now. The biggest change I’ve noticed is that before you just knew the parents and got to know the kid and the high school coach and maybe the guidance counselor. Now, I don’t know if you can establish the relationships you had before. There are a lot more people involved with these kids and their decisions. Listen, I never thought that kids would make a decision to go to a particular school based on the shoes they wear or the colour of their uniforms. But at the end of the day if you have the right things in place, if the kids think they can be coached and get better and have a chance to win, you have a chance to get them to come to your school. And that’s what we’re trying to do.
SN: You mentioned that your last NCAA gig was at Kansas. How different is it now coaching a smaller program like SMU?
LB: I have this theory: When you’re on a bad team in the NBA, you’re in the lottery; when you’re at a great program in college you get multiple lottery picks every year. So going from Kansas, UCLA and North Carolina—the three other college programs I was involved with—to SMU is a big, big difference. But I feel like we can be pretty special because we’re in a terrific conference in a great city. Having the Mavericks really helps us, too. And it happens to be a great school, so I kind of think that with the talent around here, we have a chance to be pretty good.
Now, when you’re at Kansas or North Carolina or UCLA you’re immediately on every kid’s radar. So we have to work a lot harder to attract players, but we had a terrific recruiting class this season and we’ve got the best player in the country coming here next year in Emmanuel Mudiay. So I think we’ve become relevant, to a degree, but we still have a lot of work ahead.
SN: You have a reputation as a defensive-minded coach. Do you bring the same style of play to each coaching stop? How much of that depends on who’s on your roster?
LB: My values will never change: You have to guard, you have to be unselfish, play hard and intelligently, and you have to defend and rebound. No matter where I’ve been, or no matter what the personnel is like, I think that’s something we write down on the board every day and try to do in every practice, game, and on every possession.
You know, I was the first person to say, “Play the right way.” Now it seems everybody says it. But anyways, that’s how I was taught. I’ve only inherited one team in the NBA that had a winning record before I got there, and that was Detroit. But I don’t think my values have ever changed in terms of what I think we need to do to be successful. And I don’t think I’m alone in that; I believe every coach would echo the same things that I just listed.
I played for Dean Smith, Frank McGuire, Mr. [Henry] Iba, Pete Newell, Alex Hannum—all of these guys are Hall of Fame coaches—and they all had the same values. So it’s something I ask of all my teams, and we try to do that here [at SMU]. But you have to put your players in a position to be successful and not ask them to do things that they can’t do.
SN: What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?
LB: It’s something that all of those guys I just named instilled on me: Every day I go into the gym I want my players to understand that the coaching staff and I are going to do everything we can to make them better. I don’t take that lightly. That’s what every coach I ever played for did—they made me feel like they cared about me and wanted me to be the best I could be in every area, not just basketball. I’m sure I’ve fallen short of what they were able to accomplish—and it’s not because I’m not trying—but every coach I had took an interest in me and teaching me.
SN: Given your background with Kansas, I have to ask about your thoughts on Andrew Wiggins…
LB: I got to see him when he played for Huntington Prep, so I’ve followed his career. His decision came down to Kansas, Kentucky or Florida State. Well, [Florida St. coach] Leonard Hamilton and I are real close, he was in the NBA and at Oklahoma St. when I was at KU and I’ve always admired him. And John [Calipari, Kentucky’s coach] and [Kansas coach] Bill Self both worked for me, so I was really interested in what would happen with Wiggins’s choice. But I love him and I’m thrilled he’s at Kansas.
SN: It looks like he’s going to be a one-and-done player…
LB: You know, I don’t think this one-and-done stuff is healthy for these kids. If it were up to me, I’d either let them come out of high school or make them stay three years in college. If it’s good enough for football or baseball, why can’t it be good enough for us? I’m always miffed by that.
I think you hurt the kid if you don’t let him come out and he’s going to be a lottery pick. I think it’s bad for college basketball, I think it’s bad for the NBA. If you’re a LeBron, by all means come out when you’re in high school, because you’re wasting your time [in college]. You should be out earning money, which is what a college education affords you anyways.
If you’re not going to be a lottery pick, and you’re not ready right away, you don’t lose anything by going to college. You get great coaching, you get an education and you mature in a lot of ways outside of basketball. But with Wiggins, I just want him to focus on winning a championship. When the season is over, I’m sure he’ll make the decision that’s right for him and Bill will welcome it.
SN: He didn’t have the option, but do you think Wiggins will benefit from his time in college, as opposed to going to the NBA from high school as a high lottery pick?
LB: When these kids went from high school, they usually landed on bad teams. And one of the reasons these teams are bad is because they don’t have a lot of great role models on the roster. Then you see these kids who stay at school for four years and end up going to San Antonio or Los Angeles, great teams with good quality guys like Tim Duncan or Kobe Bryant to teach them to respect the game and respect the minutes they get. So that troubles me a little bit.
For Wiggins, he would have been fine either way. This kid is grounded, from what I know about him. I think he would have been fine, but I don’t think he’s going to be hurting one bit from being with Bill. He’s going to be coached—Bill Self is as good a coach as we have. These coaches that say they developed these one-and-done kids? They’ve already been developed. But the reality is when you’re around guys like Bill Self or John Calipari for a year, you’re going to benefit.
SN: I have to ask you about playing in the ABA. When the league started in ’67, you had already begun coaching at your alma mater North Carolina. Did you think your playing days were over?
LB: I had been drafted [by the Baltimore Bullets in 1963]. We didn’t have a lot of NBA teams in those days, and if you tried out for a team or even took a meal with them, you were considered a pro. So I didn’t try out. Instead I played for Iba and USA and we won the trials and were able to go to the Olympics [in 1964]. Afterwards, Coach Smith asked me to come back [to UNC] and coach, and though I was offered the Connecticut job, I was 26 and just didn’t think I was ready.
The ABA started a few years later, and New Orleans wanted to sign Doug Moe, who was my best friend. I still played all the time, and I was still in great shape. Well, Doug told New Orleans he’d play for them if they took me, too. So I visited with Coach Smith and he told me, “Larry there’s going to be some day when you physically won’t be able to play, so if you really want to play and you feel it’s a good opportunity for you, then do it. You can always come back and coach.” So I did it.
I think I would have been perfectly happy to stay at North Carolina with Coach, but as it turned out I got to play five years and meet some wonderful people. The ABA was a phenomenal league and a great experience for me. I really lucked out.
The ABA, when we merged with the NBA, was just seven teams. Four of them went into the NBA whole—Indiana, New Jersey, San Antonio and Denver, where I coached at the time—and then the other three teams disbanded. After the merger, the NBA wouldn’t allow us to participate in the draft, and then they wouldn’t allow us to participate in the dispersal draft either. Even with that being said, San Antonio and [Denver both] won our divisions in the first year in the NBA. And then if you look at the All-Star game, within two years of the merger half of the all-star teams were made up of former ABA players.
I coached the ABA vs. NBA All-Star game in Houston at the Astrodome. Our team was every bit as good as the NBA, and that was only two years before the merger. They won by one point or something like that, but it wasn’t a typical All-Star game, both teams wanted to win bad. I was just in awe of being part of that.
SN: Looking back at all of these great teams you’ve been a part of, do any of them stick out above the others?
LB: Ha! No, you don’t know me from Adam, but you have to know that I’m doing exactly what I had hoped to do since I was a young kid. Well, I really wanted to be a high school coach—coaching baseball, basketball and football, have the summers off—my career took some strange turns.
But everywhere I’ve been—even if some places hadn’t been exactly the way I’d envisioned—I’ve always just felt lucky to be able to do what I do. I’m 73, I’m still able to do this. It’s pretty fortunate.
Look, I didn’t handle retirement well. I was lucky that all of these coaches let me come and watch them practice and be involved in their programs. My dearest friends are in this profession. So it’s all been good.