Steve Kerr: Erik Spoelstra ‘great choice’ for Team USA coach

Golden State Warriors head coach Steve Kerr has said Erik Spoelstra is a great choice to coach Team USA. Kerr reckons the Miami Heat coach was ready for the challenge of coaching the national team a long time ago.

Kerr took USA to glory in the Paris Olympics and he is confident that Spoelstra is going to deliver the goods for the team. The Dubs coach faced off with Spoelstra, the current U.S. Olympic men’s basketball coach, on Wednesday night for the first time since the Heat sideline boss was officially hired by USA Basketball to take over the national team.

“He was a great choice,” Kerr said before Golden State’s 110-96 loss in Miami. “He’s one of the great coaches of all time. Great awareness of what FIBA is about, the difference between coaching a team for seven weeks and coaching one for nine months, all of that stuff. He’s just got his finger on the pulse of it all. He’s going to be great.”

Spoelstra will lead the U.S. men at the 2027 World Cup in Doha, Qatar, and the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics. On the other hand, Kerr led US in 2023 World Cup where the team surprisingly finished in fourth place. Spoelstra was part of Kerr’s coaching staff in the 2023 World Cup and also the Paris Olympics.

“I’ve said it before, but I’m just so incredibly grateful for having that opportunity to be on his staff for the last two summers,” Spoelstra said. “The entire staff, we had such an amazing time. It was a life experience. It was Basketball 101. We all grew from it, just from a basketball coaching development experience. It’s the same four lines and two baskets and a basketball, but it’s a different sport, FIBA. And we were humbled in that first year and the second year, I think, the experiences that we had the summer before helped us for that Olympic experience.”

Spoelstra said he was really impressed by Steve Kerr when he worked under his tutelage.

“I was so impressed with Steve just in terms of the way he was able to manage everything,” Spoelstra said. “We all know that there is great pressure. I think he, as part of his genius, he managed that beautifully. Just getting the team, one, to handle all the expectations, and then getting the team to hit the stride at just the right time and be able to handle adversity like we did against Serbia. I think it was just great leadership on his part. That experience will be something I’ll never forget.”