Philadelphia 76ers And Former NBA Head Coach Mike D'Antoni Are Match Made In Heaven

Mike D'Antoni Philadelphia 76ers
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After bringing Jerry Colangelo on board early last week, the Philadelphia 76ers may have another move up their sleeve that could be finalized in the upcoming days. According to Yahoo! Sports, the Sixers are in discussions with former NBA head coach Mike D’Antoni to become the team’s associate head coach. Assuming that these negotiations do not hit a snag, D’Antoni would be a spectacular addition to a Philadelphia team that seems to come under fire after every game.

For the Sixers, D’Antoni makes sense for multiple reasons. For one, D’Antoni in many ways pioneered the current era of pace-and-space that was such a revolutionary type of thinking just a few years ago. At the height of the Phoenix Suns‘ appex in the 2006-07 season, D’Antoni’s team logged the second-highest combination of layup attempt rate and three-point attempt rate according to NBA.com/Stats. This mindset has now flooded the league, with the 76ers sitting right in the middle of this attention.

With this style of play, Phoenix dominated on the offensive end of the floor. During their 61-win season, the Suns notched a 111.4 offensive rating, a number that beat the next-best team by 2.9 points per 100 possessions. The Suns also logged the highest true shooting percentage of any team in the league at 59.0 percent, 2.9 percentage points better than any other of their counterparts.

Although Sam Hinkie‘s 76ers have yet to experience these type of results due to inexperienced personnel coupled with aggravatingly simple offensive sets, D’Antoni could be a strong influence on softening some of the pain. Brett Brown clearly wants his squad to play with pace (the Sixers have finished top six in possessions per game in both of his first two full seasons), and D’Antoni’s mentorship will aid the rookie NBA head coach in that effort.

Additionally, under D’Antoni’s guidance in 2013-14, Sixers point guard Kendall Marshall posted the best year of his NBA career. Over this campaign, Marshall tallied 11.0 assists per 36 minutes, looking more comfortable than ever at the professional level. Although the names are certainly less notable than the players D’Antoni manned in Phoenix, a small-ball lineup featuring Marshall alongside Robert Covington, Jerami Grant and Nerlens Noel has the potential to have a similar play style as those run-and-gun Suns teams.

Ultimately, it appears as if D’Antoni has the credentials and fit to be an elite “offensive coordinator” in Philadelphia. Although this news will likely go under the radar, the Sixers are making a move that will surely catapult the organization in the long run.

Nicholas Sciria is a writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @Nick_Sciria, “Like” him on Facebook or add him to your network on Google.

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