Toronto fires Nick Nurse, who led Raptors to 2019 NBA title

TORONTO (AP)— Nick Nurse was fired Friday as coach of the Toronto Raptors, fouryears after he led the franchise to its first and only NBAchampionship.

Nurse went227-163 in his five seasons with the Raptors, with his .582 winningpercentage ranking as the best of any coach in franchisehistory.

The lastthree seasons have not gone as the team planned. The Raptors missedthe playoffs in 2021, a year where they were forced to call Tampa,Florida, home because of the COVID-19 pandemic and the challenge ofgetting teams in and out of Canada for games. They lost in thefirst round in 2022, and lost an elimination game at home in theplay-in tournament this season.

“The decisionto make a change like this is never arrived at easily or takenlightly, especially when it comes to a person who has been anintegral part of this franchise’s most historic accomplishments,and who has been a steady leader through some of our team’s mostchallenging times,” Raptors President Masai Ujiri said.

Ujiri calledthe move “an opportunity for us to reset, to refocus, to put intoplace the personnel and the players who will help us reach our goalof winning our next championship.”

Nurse waswith the Raptors for 10 seasons, the first five as an assistant. Hesuggested in March that he might take some time after the season todecide his own future.

“Just see howthe relationship with the organization is and everything,” Nursesaid. “It’s been 10 years for me, which is a pretty good run. Overthose 10 years, we’ve got to be up there in number of wins withanybody in the league.”

He was right:Only Golden State (.661) has a better winning percentage thanToronto (.613) in that timespan.

Former Bostoncoach Ime Udoka is among the coaches whom Toronto is expected toconsider for Nurse’s replacement. Udoka, who has been close withUjiri for years, led the Celtics to the NBA Finals last season,then was suspended for this season after the disclosure of aninappropriate relationship with a female Celtics employee.

It’s alsolikely that Nurse will be considered for current openings in theNBA, given that he’s won everywhere he has been.

Nurse playedat Northern Iowa, then started his coaching career there as anassistant and wound up becoming a head coach at Grand ViewUniversity when he was just 23. He coached in Belgium and Britain —winning a pair of British Basketball League titles as a coach inBirmingham in 1996 and London in 2000 — then got a couple titles inwhat is now called the G League.

The second GLeague crown got him noticed. He guided Rio Grande Valley to atitle in 2013 and that’s when the Raptors called and wanted to talkto him about offense. They ended up hiring him as an assistant, andhe was with Toronto ever since.