George Willis

George Willis

NBA

Kidd gets first win under belt

After putting the finishing touches on their 104-88 win over the Jazz at Barclays Center on Tuesday night, the Nets gathered in their locker room and paid homage to their coach.

Jason Kidd was presented with the game ball, symbolic of his first victory as a head coach after enduring an ugly 107-86 loss in his coaching debut Sunday in Orlando.

“It was good to get his first win at home,” said Kevin Garnett, who apologized to the rookie coach for the team’s performance in Orlando. “When he looks back this group will be a part of that.”

Kidd seemed appreciative of the gesture, his first basketball award earned in a suit instead of sneakers.

“They presented me with the game ball, which is a classy thing,” Kidd said. “But the game ball goes to those guys because they did the work as a team.”

Kidd is working his way through this coaching stuff, trying to get the most out of his players the way he once got the most out of his teammates. His record as a head coach is now at .500 after missing the Nets first two games because of an NBA suspension for driving impaired more than a year ago.

Already, he has experienced the high and lows of coaching. While the loss at Orlando didn’t raise questions about his coaching ability, it did present an early test on how to get his team to refocus after a tough defeat. That can be tricky for a coach, especially when he has a veteran team and individuals who are set in their ways may not think they need much coaching.

But Kidd put his team through a tough practice on Monday and told his players they needed to be consistent and trust each other more if they were going to succeed. He told them although they may have been stars on other teams, they would need to do more of the little things on this team.

Judging from their performance against the Jazz, the message was well-received. Still trying to rebuild after trading Deron Williams to the Nets, the Jazz are a young team still seeking its first win of the season. They were easy fodder for the Nets, who turned a 54-38 lead at halftime into an 85-61 lead heading into the final quarter as Kidd substituted freely throughout the game.

After settling for too many jump shot against the Magic, Kidd spent much of Monday’s practice demanding his players push the ball inside. Against the Jazz, they scored 58 points in the paint, with Brook Lopez, scoring a team-high 27.

“It’s about getting the ball in the paint and going from there,” Kidd said.

It’s logical to wonder whether Jason Kidd the coach would be much different than Jason Kidd the player. Coaches normally have to disassociate themselves a bit from players. They can’t be best friends. They can’t hang out. Heck an assistant coach can become unrecognizable when he becomes a head coach. The pressure of being in the hot seat can create a change in personality.

But Kidd always was teaching, directing and motivating throughout his playing career, so to him there’s not much difference now that he’s on the sidelines.

“I don’t think there’s much of a difference if there’s a real conversation,” Kidd said. “When it was player to player, if you’re real and if you can digest the truth, it’s just like a coach telling you something. It’s the person who receives the information. Can you digest the truth? Can you accept it, and can you get better from it. The way I’m going about my coaching is as if I’m a player telling them what I see, and being honest and being real.”

So far it has earned him one very special game ball.