Boston Celtics: Danny Ainge Rolls the Dice with Brad Stevens hire

Brad Stevens was hired Wednesday to become the new coach of the Boston Celtics, a stunning move considering Stevens is only 36 and has just six years of head coaching experience at Butler University under his belt.

But Stevens did more than a lot of college basketball coaches ever do before he turned 35. Two national championship appearances at a school that most people couldn’t have found with a GPS five years ago made Stevens a hot commodity in college coaching, but he opted to stay at Butler.

On Stevens’ watch, Butler soared to unprecedented heights. Riding those two title game appearances and a long track record of mid-major success under coaches such as Barry Collier, Thad Matta, Todd Lickliter and Stevens, Butler moved from the low-profile Horizon League to the Atlantic 10 Conference.

Then came the Holy Grail for Butler, an invitation to play beginning in 2013-14 in the Big East Conference in what will be Year 1 of that league’s reaffirmation as a basketball-first-last-and-only circuit.

But Stevens won’t be there because Celtics general manager Danny Ainge decided to roll the dice on what is turning into an extreme basketball team makeover in the Hub.

Stevens—who with a 166-49 record in six years at Butler set an NCAA record for the most victories by a coach in his first six seasons—agreed to a six-year contract to become coach of the Celtics. At 36, he will be the youngest coach in the NBA and will be taking over on the ground floor as the Celtics transition abruptly from the Kevin Garnett–Paul Pierce–Ray Allen era to a new age, with star players yet to be determined.

Boston still has All-Star point guard Rajon Rondo, who is recovering from a torn ACL suffered in January. Rondo has been at the center of trade rumors, with the Dallas Mavericks coming up as the most likely destination, according to the rumor mill.

But Ainge told The Associated Press Monday that he’s not looking to move Rondo.

"Maybe the assumption is that we’ll give away any of our players. There’s been calls for [Rondo, Jeff Green, Courtney Lee, Brandon Bass, Jared Sullinger and first-round draft pick Kelly Olynyk]. And maybe the assumption is we are just changing everybody, but we’re not. We’re starting to get younger."

ESPN NBA analyst Jon Barry told USA Today Wednesday night he believes Stevens’ success or failure with the Celtics will hinge on the relationship he is able to forge with the talented but mercurial point guard.

"It certainly hasn’t turned out well for most recent college coaches who have made the jump to the NBA. We’ve seen one after another struggle. Boston is rebuilding and it’s going to be a difficult transition. But they have a pretty good young group and sometimes that has a lot to do with the hire. He’s probably going to get along well with the players and a lot of the players have been in college recently and know what Brad Stevens has done. But the big question is how does Rajon Rondo feel. If he’s not on board, it can create problems all the way down."

Barry is not the only talking head to mention the dismal track record of recent coaches who have made the leap from the college ranks to the pros, including Rick Pitino going from Kentucky to the Celtics in 1997, Mike Montgomery moving from Stanford to the Golden State Warriors in 2004 or even Jerry Tarkanian making the leap from UNLV to the San Antonio Spurs in 1992.

But Stevens is not a middle-aged (or older), well-established coach.

Rick Pitino was already an NCAA champion coach when he went to the Boston Celtics in 1997.

Pitino was 44 when he went to Boston. Montgomery was 57 when he took over in Golden State. Tarkanian was 62 by the time he got to San Antonio.

A more apt comparison might be to Pitino, just at a different time. Pitino was 34 when he was hired away from Providence by the New York Knicks in 1987. He led a Knicks team that had won 71 games over the previous three seasons to the playoffs in his first year and to the second round of the playoffs in his second. But the challenge presented by rebuilding Kentucky after the scandal-ridden Eddie Sutton era was too attractive and Pitino bolted Madison Square Garden in 1989.

Bill Fitch was 36 when he left the University of Minnesota to coach the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Taking a ride in the way-back machine, Bill Fitch was 36 when he was hired away from the University of Minnesota to become the first coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers in 1970. Fitch built a 15-win expansion team into a conference finalist in six seasons.

Fitch went on to win 944 games as an NBA coach, won an NBA title with the Celtics in 1981, was a two-time NBA Coach of the Year and, as part of the league’s 50th anniversary celebration in 1996, was named one of the top 10 coaches in NBA history.

But if you want a comparison that’s almost spooky in its similarity with Stevens, try this one on for size.

Dick Motta successfully transitioned from tiny Weber State College to the Chicago Bulls. (Wikimedia Commons)

Dick Motta was 36—the same as Stevens—when he was hired away from little Weber State College (before it graduated to university status) to coach the Chicago Bulls in 1968.

Motta had coached the Wildcats to a 98-29 record in five seasons in Ogden, Utah, winning three Big Sky Conference titles and leading Weber State to its first-ever NCAA tournament appearance in 1968.

The Bulls were entering their third season as an expansion team and had lost coach Red Kerr to the even-newer expansion Phoenix Suns.

Motta led the Bulls to the playoffs in his second season. In his third year, Chicago started a string of four consecutive 50-win seasons under Motta.

He went on to win an NBA title with the Washington Bullets in 1981, was the first coach of the Dallas Mavericks and took them to the playoffs by their fourth season and won 935 games and a Coach of the Year award in his long career.

Yes, times are different from when Fitch and Motta began their NBA coaching careers. The money is bigger, the players have more control and the egos are gargantuan. You could also say that about the difference between when Pitino was hired by the Knicks, near the beginning of the NBA’s salary-cap era, and today.

But it’s not that different. If you know the game, you know the game.

Brad Stevens showed in six years at Butler that he does, indeed, know the game. Perhaps 30 years from now, some writer will be detailing his rise from small-school obscurity to NBA bench success.