Former Partizan and Rytas guard Milt Palacio joins Blazers' coaching staff / News - Basketnews.com

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The Portland Trail Blazers have hired Scott Brooks, Roy Rogers, Steve Hetzel, Edniesha Curry, and Milt Palacio as assistant coaches and Parker Hines as video coordinator, adding to head coach Chauncey Billups’ staff, it was announced today by president of basketball operations Neil Olshey.

Palacio comes to the Trail Blazers after most recently spending two seasons as an assistant coach with the Long Island Nets of the NBA G League from 2018 through 2020. Previously, Palacio served for one season as head coach of Durham United in the Canadian Basketball League (2016-17) and spent two seasons as the director of player development at the University of Idaho.

A Los Angeles native and Colorado State alumnus, Palacio played seven seasons in the NBA with Vancouver, Boston, Phoenix, Cleveland, Toronto, and Utah from 1999-2006 before playing six seasons overseas from 2007-13, wearing the jerseys of Partizan, Khimki, and Caja Laboral, among others. In the last season of his pro career, he split time between Bnei HaSharon in Israel and Lietuvos Rytas in Lithuania. Palacio has dual citizenship in Belize, where he played for the national team and now serves as its head coach.

Brooks joins the Trail Blazers after serving as the head coach of the Washington Wizards for the last five seasons. In 12 seasons as a head coach with Oklahoma City (2008-15) and Washington, he has a career record of 521-414 (.557). The 2010 NBA Coach of the Year, Brooks has led his teams to eight playoff berths, including a trip to the NBA Finals in 2012 and Western Conference Finals appearances in 2011 and 2014. He has four 50-win seasons to his credit, including a 60-22 mark with the Thunder during the 2012-13 season. Before becoming a head coach, Brooks worked as an assistant coach with Seattle/Oklahoma City (2007-08), Sacramento (2006-07) and Denver (2003-06). A native of Lathrop, California, Brooks played collegiately at Texas Christian University, San Joaquin Delta College and UC Irvine before embarking on a 10-year NBA career with Philadelphia, Minnesota, Houston, Dallas, New York and Cleveland. Brooks won an NBA championship in 1994 as a member of the Houston Rockets.

Rogers arrives in Portland with 13 years of experience as an NBA assistant coach. He spent the 2020-21 season with the LA Clippers, where he worked alongside Billups and helped the team reach the Western Conference Finals. Rogers spent the 2019-20 season on the Chicago bench and before that spent three seasons with Houston, which included an appearance in the Western Conference Finals in 2018. He has also worked as an assistant coach with Washington (2014-16), Brooklyn (2013-14), Detroit (2011-12), Boston (2010-11), and New Jersey (2008-10). As a player, Rogers appeared in 137 games in three NBA seasons with Vancouver, Boston, Toronto and Denver. He played four seasons at Alabama from 1992-96 before being selected with the 22nd pick of the 1996 NBA Draft.

Hetzel has spent the last seven seasons as an assistant coach under Steve Clifford, first in Charlotte (2014-18) and most recently in Orlando (2018-21). He previously was the head coach of the Canton Charge of the NBA G League during the 2013-14 season.

Curry joins the coaching staff from the University of Maine where she was an assistant coach with the men’s basketball team from 2018-21. She previously served as player development and assistant coach for the Maine women’s basketball program from 2015-17.

Hines is hired as Portland’s video coordinator after spending the 2020-21 season as an assistant coach with the Austin Spurs of the NBA G League.

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