Bucks coach Doc Rivers proud to be part of NBA Pioneers Classic

Milwaukee Bucks head coach Doc Rivers has had the honor of having met two of the NBA’s first African American pioneers and having a connection to the third.

During the 1950-51 NBA season, New York Knicks forward Nat “Sweetwater” Clifton and Boston Celtics forward Chuck Cooper and Washington Capitols forward Earl Lloyd became the first African Americans to play in the league. Rivers has previously met his fellow Chicago native in Clifton and also has spent time with Lloyd. While coaching the Celtics, Rivers also became familiar with the story of Cooper, who played for the Celtics, becoming the first Black player ever drafted into the NBA. Clifton, Cooper and Lloyd are all Naismith Basketball Hall of Famers who have passed away.

“When I first met Nat and Earl, I knew very little about them other than they were first, which is exactly why you teach history,” Rivers told Andscape. “It piques your curiosity and sent me down the rabbit hole of learning about them. The next time I saw Earl I had the honor of telling him how much I appreciated him. It meant a lot to him, but way more for me.”

Rivers and the Bucks are visiting the Celtics in Boston on Sunday in the inaugural NBA Pioneers Classic on NBA Pioneers Day. It’s also the first day of Black History Month.

The NBA Pioneers Classic will be an annual showcase played on Feb. 1 celebrating Cooper, Clifton and Lloyd. The Bucks and Celtics will wear special commemorative jersey patches and warm-up shirts for the game. The winning team will be awarded the NBA Pioneers Classic Trophy. With play-by-play voice Mark Jones, analyst Richard Jefferson and reporterAngel Gray on the call, the broadcast will mark the second consecutive year ESPN will present an NBA game with all key game production roles staffed by Black team members, including production, operations, transmission, social media, graphics, statistics and commentators.

“The NBA celebrating Pioneer Day is thoughtful, touching, and right,” Rivers said. “I’m proud of our league leaders and the National Basketball Players Association for having the courage to do what’s right. Yes, courage. In the political environment we are in at this time where Black history is being whitewashed with the removing of Black war heroes, civil right leaders from books and our kids are not being taught about the atrocities of slavery, lynchings, Jim Crow and redlining, our league has decided to stand up an teach our young players and everyone the true history of our league. Bravo, NBA.”

While Rivers has coached the Bucks, Orlando Magic, Los Angeles Clippers and Philadelphia 76ers, his most notably years as an NBA head coach were with the Celtics. Rivers was with Boston from 2004-2013 winning a title in 2008 and a 2010 Eastern Conference championship. The former NBA guard has coached for 27 seasons with a record of 1,180-844 entering the Celtics game. Rivers ranks sixth in the NBA all-time in coaching wins only surpassed by Gregg Popovich, Don Nelson, Lenny Wilkens, Jerry Sloan and Pat Riley. Rivers is also the winningest active NBA head coach and is a current nominee for the second time for the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.

The following is a Q&A with Rivers with Andscape in which he reflects on his time in Boston, his coaching mentors and trusted contemporaries, his Hall of Fame hopes, the state of African American coaches in the NBA, coaching with his son, Spencer, on his staff and more.

Does it still mean something for you to coach a game in Boston?

For me, having this game played in Boston has special meaning. Not just because it’s where I spent nine years coaching there. But more importantly, it’s where one of these three giants [Cooper] was drafted and also where Red Auerbach coached and was a champion for standing up and doing the right thing.

How did you feel when your first nomination to the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame didn’t lead to you becoming a finalist?

Was I surprised? Yeah. But it’s not why I’m doing this. Obviously, those are great honors. Being the Hall of Fame is an amazing honor. The numbers speak for themselves. But I swear there’s nothing that is on my mind. [On Dec. 30, 2025] when we won [against the Charlotte Hornets] and I moved up [to sixth passing George Karl] on the all-time coaching win list, the coaches and everybody were so excited about it. I didn’t even know that I passed him. I didn’t even know who. And I don’t think people realize that. That’s not why most people do anything. My thing is to be the best coach I can and to make players better. And that has served me very well.

I get a title for being this ‘Player coach.’ Sometimes I am. Sometimes I’m not. One thing I’ve done all through my career is I tell players what I think they need to do to win. Not necessarily for them to be better, but to win, which will make them better. And I would say 80 percent of the time that goes really well. Twenty percent of the time that goes really poorly with individuals, not as a team. But my teams have always, for the most part, achieved or overachieved. I have had very few underachieving teams. That’s all I do it for; it’s for the relationships.

Would getting in the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame mean a lot to you?

It would mean a lot, but only because you deserve it. I don’t wonder if I don’t. I think I do, but I’m not going to campaign for myself. It’s not my job. My job is to focus on my job. That’s it. Everything else will take care of itself…

It’ll mean the world to me because it’s only my life. The only thing I’ve ever done is basketball. And basketball has done so many great things for me. The first time I met George Raveling is interesting. I was the high school player of the year in Chicago, and they had a speaker named George Raveling and never heard of them at that time. And he said, ‘Use the basketball, don’t let the basketball use you.’ It was one of the things he said. And I have always thought about that because I’ve seen so many players get that wrong.

And I’ve got myself in trouble as a coach with players because I get involved where every coach when I took the job told me not to get involved. And I’m like, ‘Why wouldn’t you get involved in these guys’ lives?’ You’re trying to make them better people. You’re trying to save them from society where they grew up. And if that goes wrong because you’ve told them, you can live with that. But if it goes wrong because you didn’t tell them, you can’t live with that. That’s the way I’ve always coached.

What do you think of the fact that everybody in the NBA’s Top 10 in all-time coaching wins list is in the Hall of Fame with exception to you?

I didn’t even know that. Well, that speaks for itself. Honestly, I didn’t even know that until you brought that up, I forgot about it. That’s the point. And with winning a [NBA] Championship, being in the [NBA Finals] twice, coaches can go to their whole career without get to the Finals and never win the Finals. I’ve done both and I’ve done it twice. But winning is hard, man. You got to get everything to come your way to do it.

The coach just ahead of you on the NBA coaching win list is Pat Riley. What does that mean to have him next ahead of you?

Now that one, I will say, because it’s so funny, Marc. Again, after the Charlotte game we won and everybody’s excited. I was clueless. And then my daughter calls like, ‘Aren’t you excited?’ I said, ‘I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m excited about.’ And then she said, ‘Well, if you win some more, you can pass Pat Riley.’ Well, Pat Riley is the reason I’m coaching. He’s the only reason I’m coaching.

I had no interest in coaching. And then I played for Pat Riley and it was the first time in a long time, I said, ‘Man, I want to be that.’ And so, to catch up to him would be pretty cool for me.

Who would you consider to be your coaching mentors?

Well, I got to say this is pretty sad. Two of them died. George Raveling was my number one guy. And John Thompson Sr. Those are two of my guys and Rick Majerus. And it’s really sad when I think about even now, because whenever something happens, first of all, they would call. Rick Majerus was calling it every [expletive] night. My parents, they’re gone.

I still have guys now that I talk to. Some are still in the league. Some of the guys that I’ve mentored, [Los Angeles Clippers head coach] Ty [Lue] calls me, I call him. But the pride I have watching Ty do what he does — Ty sat there for seven years [next to me]. He’s got every single play that I’ve ever run from shootarounds and practices. Half these plays I don’t run ever. He said it best. He said, ‘It’s like Steven Wonder with all these hits, but you don’t play them.’

And I said, ‘Not only can I not run them, I can’t remember half of them because that’s why I used to write them down.’ So. he has this book. And it’s so funny, Ty’s known as a great ATO [after timeout plays] coach. I’m like, ‘Yeah, it’s cool.’ And the funniest thing two years ago, they beat us in Philly. They came back and won. We had a big lead, blew the game, and they beat us with two ATOs, they were my [expletive] plays. That drove me nuts after the game. I didn’t know they were coming because you don’t know which one’s going.

I talk to [Michigan State men’s basketball head coach] Tom Izzo some still, too. We’re very close. It’s so important to have someone to ground you, to remind you, because the world is tough. You get beat up a lot as a coach. You just do. And now more than ever. I woke up this morning [Jan. 4] and ESPN had a whole list of all the 32 NFL coaches talk about who is going to get fired? And I’m like, ‘What?’ The talk of that hurts your job. But that’s the world. And it doesn’t bother me. I just keep doing my job.

I’ve never in my career looked backwards at all. You win, you lose, and you move on, you get better. I’ve had a lot of success in the playoffs. I have way more success as far as winning games. Most coaches don’t even get to 500 wins. Winning is hard, and that’s what people don’t understand.

In terms of NBA great Lenny Wilkens dying last year, how did that affect you?

Lenny was another one. I’m sorry. He was probably my first [mentor] because when I first started coaching, Ryles [Riley] was still coaching. So, it wasn’t like I was going to talk to Pat Riley. Lenny, I should have brought that up. He was the number one guy early on. We have the same agent, Lonnie Cooper. And so that’s how I met him and I got to know Lenny really well.

What do you think about the state of African American head coaches now in a predominately Black NBA?

Inconsistent is the word I would use. We have a run, then we don’t. I love the community of us. [Charlotte Hornets head coach] Charles [Lee], [Detroit Pistons head coach] JB Bickerstaff, [New York Knicks head coach] Mike Brown, we communicate. And I love the coaching community overall.

I don’t think people understand how much we want to beat each other, and that can create its own thing. There’s coaches you don’t even talk to. You have rivals all the time. And then even those that come around and you’re at some function, you sit next to them and all of a sudden we got the same s—, the same issues. I love coaching. I love players. But players overall, if I thought about my journey through the years, how many of them are still in my life? But some of them come back to your life. And I tell coaches that, ‘When you coach, the players are going to disappoint you sometimes.’ You make them better. You pour love into them and then something goes wrong or you trade them or you start playing someone else.

Then most of those guys come back and realize it wasn’t [personal]. That happens all the time. And some don’t come back and that’s fine, too, because I can say I’ve never met a coach that wasn’t trying to do the right thing every time. That’s the difference. Coaches are playing to win. All of us. And players are playing to get better. They have far more agendas. The coaching agenda is simple. You got to win.

What does it mean to have your son, Spencer, on your coaching staff?

When I left Philly, he had two or three different offers from different teams and he ended up going with Monty [Williams] in Detroit. And then Detroit wanted to keep him. I wanted him with me. Spencer has been a coach his whole life. [My son] Jeremiah made [prep] all-star teams and went to Georgetown. [My daughter] Callie was our best athlete by far. The kids hate when I say it. And then Austin [a former NBA player] was all-everything.

And here comes the fourth kid. I have photos of Spencer sitting next to Jeremiah’s coach in high school. Then when Austin was playing in high school, he was on the team sitting next to the coach. Spencer has been coaching his whole life. And what I like about him is that’s what he wanted to do. It was so simple. He left college and he worked right away, went to summer leagues and worked. So, he’s got a hell of a mind.

The post Bucks coach Doc Rivers proud to be part of NBA Pioneers Classic appeared first on Andscape.