Steve Kerr would consider coaching
by Michael Hiestand, USA TODAY Sports
As a lead CBS/Turner NCAA men’s basketball tournament game analyst, Steve Kerr will be sitting courtside through coverage of the Final Four.
But eventually, he might be prowling the NCAA sidelines — as a coach.
“Sure, I’d consider (college) coaching,” Kerr tells USA TODAY Sports. “The college game is something I’ve loved and always been intrigued by, going back to when my dad was teaching at UCLA and I was a ball boy there.”
Kerr, who will also call TNT NBA action through the Eastern Conference Finals, notes he has become “more entrenched” with the pros than with the college game. He played 15 NBA seasons before retiring in 2003 and was the Phoenix Suns’ basketball operations president and general manager from 2007-2010.
Kerr, who will work Wisconsin’s game against Mississippi on Friday (TruTV, 12:40 p.m. ET), says he left his Suns’ job in part to spend more time with his three children, “But the empty nest is approaching in three years. So I can see diving back in” — and getting out of broadcasting.
He says he’s not so interested in heading back to a front office job. “I think coaching to me is more intriguing than management,” he says. “The pleasure I get from the game is being involved with players.”
Kerr says he hasn’t formally interviewed with any teams about coaching jobs — yet. “But I’ve tried to pick a lot of people’s brains. I’m sort of preparing for it, without it being a formal process.”
And, besides, “You never know what happens in life.”
With Kerr’s basketball career, that’s an understatement. He didn’t get any scholarship offers until a month before his freshman year, when he heard from Arizona and Cal State/Fullerton: “They’d lost players. I grabbed Arizona before I saw the campus. I wanted to say yes before they changed their mind.”
At Arizona, Kerr set an NCAA single-season record for three-point shooting percentage — 57.3% — before going 2-of-12 in the team’s 1988 Final Four loss to Oklahoma. “I just fell out of rhythm. … It’s probably the one game I still think about with regret to this day.”
Kerr went on to … [For more on Hiestand: NCAA analyst Steve Kerr would consider coaching, click here.]
Loading ...
