The New York Knicks head coach started to coach back in 1981 as an assistant coach at Salem State College.
He was there three years as an assistant before becoming head coach in 1984. The following season, Thibodeau became an assistant coach at Harvard University, and he coached at Harvard for four years before starting his NBA journey.
Tom Thibodeau’s first job in the league was with the Minnesota Timberwolves in 1989. From there, he went to the Seattle SuperSonics in 1991 as an advance scout. After that year, he signed a deal with San Antonio Spurs, where he worked with famous NBA coaches Jerry Tarkanian and John Lucas.
Lucas departed to Philadelphia two years later, and Thibs decided to go with him. He worked one season for the Houston Rockets.
Thibodeau returns to New York
The arrival of Thibodeau for the 2020-21 season to the New York Knicks organization would start a second stage for the coach in the team.
He was Jeff Van Gundy’s assistant between 1996 and 2004, and it had always been his desire to be in New York as a head coach for the Knicks.
In that eight years with Jeff Van Gundy and Thibodeau, New York played one of the best defenses in the league, and they played one NBA finals.
He won the championship ring as Boston Celtics assistant coach (under Doc Rivers) back in the 2008 NBA Finals. He coached in 214 playoff matches in the NBA as an assistant coach. After winning the NBA Title with the Celtics, he became the NBA head coach for the first time1. He was an Olympic gold medalist in 2016 for the USA.
Tom Thibodeau – Head coach journey
The NBA is a player-dominated League, and no coach wins without the right guys, but the coach does matter, and Tom Thibodeau proves that.
Tom Thibodeau had great success coaching the Chicago Bulls, in which the best Derrick Rose set the pace on the court and he on the bench (he was named ‘Coach of the Year’ in 2011), but his time with the Minnesota Timberwolves was quite a short. In Chicago, he established himself as an elite coach, mainly because of his defensive influence.
He earned a reputation as a tough, demanding coach but effective. His defensive structures, collapsing the strong side of the rival offense (the one in which the ball is located) set the trend at the beginning of the decade but when he did not reach the Finals, in good part due to the crucial injuries of Derick Rose, the career of the started to go down.
After a tense relationship with Management, he did not come out well in Chicago but had an excellent competitive background. And in Minnesota, things were going to start to go wrong.
Tom Thibodeau – Minnesota episode
Although the coach led the team to the playoffs after 14 seasons, his time with the Wolves was marked by tensions with some players and a locker room stir that ended with Jimmy Butler’s trade to the Philadelphia 76ers and the head coach being fired. An untenable situation that precedes his arrival at the Knicks.
Tom Thibodeau – The new approach
His inability to tame a locker room basically divided into two camps: Jimmy Butler vs. Towns-Wiggins, led to his departure from Minnesota (January 2019), a team he had returned to the Playoffs fourteen years later. But that experience made him think.
Thus, for a little over a year that he was without assuming the position of another bench, Thibs was visiting franchises in which coaches close to him worked, to check from the outside his methods, his way of managing templates, to learn and limit mistakes on that court during your next adventure.
As soon as the Knicks training camp started, he did a great job translating ideas, teaching what the right thing to do was and how to collaborate. He was the new face of a Thibodeau who, before the start, had watched every Knicks game the previous season. That is to say, the new face of a man who, in his gut, was still the same obsessed man as always.
This has convinced, with his method, the group at hand. Although this method is enormously demanding from a physical and mental plane. Although it requires maximum attention and fullness in the effort. Young people have bought into the idea and understood that this path, traveled together and sacrificed for the flag, is the only one that can bring the franchise out of the abyss.
The main consequence of this is the construction of a collective identity and defensive team approach. The Knicks know what they play, their strengths, and how to survive when their weaklings attack. They have developed enough confidence in their plan to dominate the teams against which they theoretically must: last season, they had a 21-9 record against opponents below 50% wins (fourth-best in the East), something key if you want to build a positive campaign. And they have returned, in short, to be a consistent basketball team.
Tom Thibodeau – Master of destruction
The most viable way to achieve that success, under the Thibodeau formula, is, of course, team defense. Some might even say – not without reason – that it is not so much the best way as the only one in their case. The truth is that Thibodeau’s experience creating and managing elite defensive systems stands up to few comparisons in the league. He can be argued within certain areas, but not in defensive knowledge of him.
Thibs’ defensive style
His preference for overloading the strong side (the one on which the ball is currently), protecting the rim, and creating a help-side that frustrates the opponent is almost non-negotiable commandments and patterns of success. His teams do not attack the rival offense, and they do not seek to recover the ball quickly. They want to generate fatigue, boredom, and impotence to what they have in front of them.
It is actually a conservative defense, good for young guys, sustained in low rhythms and physical battle. If you can’t take advantage of that defense to score an easy basket in transition, don’t take advantage.
Tom Thibodeau – Defensive Stats as a Knicks head coach
Last season Knicks had made their defense into the NBA Top 5 since 2012, But, furthermore, various data from the Knicks in some of the main defensive categories this season are very revealing:
- Defensive efficiency: 3rd (107.6 points allowed per 100 possessions)
- Three-point defense: 1st (33.6% allowed)
- Defense one meter or less from the rim: 3rd (63.9% allowed)
- Points Awarded in Paint: 4th (43 per game)
- Defense in transition: 4th (1.05 points allowed per possession)
- Finally, the Sixers are the best defensive team currently in the NBA
New York Knicks’ Tom Thibodeau won Coach of the Year for the second year.
For the second time, he has been named the NBA Coach of the Year. The New York Knicks coach guided the team he grew up watching this season to a 10-win improvement. He outscored the Phoenix Suns coach Monty Williams (with whom he used to work as assistant coaches) with eleven points a game while Utah’s Quin Snyder finished third.
Thibodeau received 43 first-place votes and garnered 351 total points from a global panel of 100 sports journalists. While the Knicks lost to the Atlanta Hawks in the first round, it was a successful season in Gotham.
A power forward Julius Randle, who was named the NBA’s Most Improved Player last month, played the All-Star. Canadian forward RJ Barrett took a significant step forward in his second season. Lastly, guard Immanuel Quickley contributed immediately as a rookie for the Knicks, who had a top-five defense all season. For this reason, Thibs proved he can develop young players.
This marks Thibodeau’s second winning title in the first year with a new team after doing it with the Chicago Bulls in 2011. The New York Knicks went from being expected to compete for the top spot in the draft lottery to earn home-court advantage in the first playoff round as four-seed.
Tom Thibodeau – achievements
- So far, Thibs has a record of 401 wins and 283 losses.
- He was the fastest coach in NBA history to reach 100 wins.
- With the Chicago Bulls, he tied the winning record for the rookie coaches.
- His teams increased the winning percentage by more than 50% with every new head coaching job he took.
- Twice he was won the NBA Coach of the Year Award (2011 and 2020).
Tom Thibodeau – Personal life
Tom Thibodeau never got married, although he was once engaged. Nobody knows real reasons, but some speculations say he was unwilling to get distracted from his coaching profession.
Tom Thibodeau – Relationship with Derrick Rose
During their time together in Chicago, D-Rose and Thibs made it to the playoffs for five seasons each year. In the 2010/11 season, it wasn’t until the Eastern Conference Finals against the Miami Heat and the then freshly formed Big Three around LeBron James over.
This first season together was also the most successful individually for Derrick Rose. At just 22 years old, the Chicago-born point guard became the youngest player of all time to win the Most Valuable Player (MVP) award.
The young Derrick Rose got a lot of offensive freedom, was able to develop ultimately, and as a result, with the same playing time, scored five points more per game than in the last season before Coach Thibs. The incredibly emotional story of the Hometown hero, who was to bring the glorious franchise back to the successes of the past few decades helped Rose reach MVP status.
Unfortunately, the lofty promises could never be kept. Injuries ruined the Windy City Assassin’s promising career and the Bulls fans’ dreams of the first championships after the Jordan dynasty. Again and again, the knee was broken, time after time. Rose fought her way back, only to suffer another setback. Finally, Derrick left the Bulls in 2016. Coach Tom Thibodeau had already been sacked a season earlier.
Derrick Rose tried to gain a foothold with many teams in the following years but was still severely affected by injuries. The now 32-year-old probably played his best season since Chicago in 2018-19 with the T-Wolves. Coach in Minnesota?
Not surprisingly, Tom Thibodeau. Derrick Rose delivered a remarkable 18 points with the highest three-point quota of his career to date (37%). The absolute highlight of his season was the game against Utah Jazz, in which he was able to achieve a new career-high of 50 points.
Tom Thibodeau – One more time together
This season led by Rose as the team’s second-unit leader, the New York substitutes are among the most competitive teams in the League and the best defense. Rose is now a complete player with polished technique and excellent game intelligence, and, above all, he found a way to stay healthy, which has been the worst drag on his career.
Derrick Rose averages 21 points, 4.6 assists, and 61% shooting from the field in his last five games. His performance has been vital in achieving the three triumphs achieved in that period and it is his personal best in the last two seasons.
Derrick Rose now doesn’t have the explosive strength that he had in his youth. Now he is an accurate finisher near the rim, and he still has the speed, cunning, and determination to break through rival defenses.
Who does Tom Thibodeau coach?
He is currently the head coach of the New York Knicks. He was able to guide the team to their first playoffs appearance since the 2012-2013 season.
What nationality is Tom Thibodeau?
Tom Thibodeau is an American coach. He was born in New Britain, Connecticut, United States.
Is Tom Thibodeau a good coach?
In his long years as an NBA head coach, Tom Thibodeau has developed a reputation as one of the league’s top defensive minds. His teams have consistently ranked near the top of the league in defensive efficiency, and he has been named Coach of the Year on two occasions. However, Thibodeau’s success has not been limited to the defensive end of the court. He has also shown an ability to develop young talent, helping to mold players like Derrick Rose and Jimmy Butler into All-Stars.
