Hoops Habit
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NBA: Greatest head coach in each team’s franchise history

By Josh Cornelissen

Gregg Popovich, Manu Ginobili, San Antonio Spurs. (Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images)
Gregg Popovich, Manu Ginobili, San Antonio Spurs. (Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images) /
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Jerry Sloan, John Stockton, Utah Jazz
Jerry Sloan, John Stockton, Utah Jazz. (Photo by Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE via Getty Images) /

Greatest head coach in Utah Jazz history: Jerry Sloan, 1988-11

Some people spend so much time in a certain place that they are forever linked. The cast of Friends will always be identified with that show, no matter the other television and movies the actors star in.

Brett Favre is a Green Bay Packer, despite his late-career stint with the Minnesota Vikings. Michael Jordan may as well have never played for the Washington Wizards, nor Hakeem Olajuwon with the Toronto Raptors.

The same goes for Jerry Sloan, who coached the Utah Jazz for 23 seasons through all the ups and downs. He took Karl Malone and John Stockton, helped turn them into one of the greatest pairings in NBA history. Sloan then continued as a Utah and NBA institution with the Jazz until his retirement in 2011.

None of the five Jazz coaches who preceded Sloan posted a career winning percentage with the team, although Frank Layden won the first few playoff series in franchise history. In the most recent years of Jazz basketball, Quin Snyder has racked up 227 wins in five seasons.

Yet the sheer length of Sloan’s time with the Jazz is staggering. He totaled 1,127 wins for Utah, a single-team total matched only by Gregg Popovich, who in 2019-20 will pass Sloan for seasons coaching a single team. The Jazz went to the postseason 19 times during Sloan’s tenure, winning 96 games, including two trips to the NBA Finals in losing efforts to Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls.

Jerry Sloan is Jazz basketball as far as most fans of the team are concerned. The combination of Sloan, Stockton and Malone is one of the greatest in league history. His sheer volume alone might be worth this nod, but he combined it with excellence on and off the court.