Toronto Raptors point guard Kyle Lowry credited head coach Nick Nurse for the team's resounding 123-109 win over the Golden State Warriors in Game 3 of the 2019 NBA Finals.
More specifically, Lowry tipped his hat off to Nurse's extensive coaching experience for the crucial victory on Wednesday.
“Nick looks young, but he's pretty old. He's been doing this a long time… His mind for the game has been special, and the growth throughout the year has been pretty good for him,” per Josh Lewenberg of The Sports Network.
Nurse began his coaching career as an assistant of the Northern Iowa Panthers men's basketball team in 1989. He was the 2011 NBA D-League Coach of the Year who guided the Iowa Energy to the league title that year. Nurse won his second NBA D-League title with the Rio Grande Valley Vipers two years later.
Nurse then served as Dwane Casey's assistant with the Raptors from 2013 to 2018. Toronto named him head coach after they fired Casey in May of 2018.
With no NBA head coaching experience tucked under his belt, Nurse guided the upstart Raptors to the league's second-best record (58-24) this season. More significantly, he led Toronto to its first NBA Finals appearance in its 24-year history.
Lowry is right, Nurse's coaching wisdom was as big part of the Raptors' win in Game 3. The latter's Warriors counterpart, Steve Kerr, is no slouch, either: he has three NBA championship rings as Golden State's head coach.
The battle of wits between Nurse and Kerr continues in Game 4, and it should be interesting to watch those two go at it again.
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