On Monday, the Atlanta Hawks officially announced that the franchise had fired coach Lloyd Pierce – something that current San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich thinks may well come back to haunt the Eastern Conference franchise.
With Atlanta giving 44-year-old Pierce just 34 games in 2020-21, it will now be former Indiana Pacers coach Nate McMillan, who will try to fix the ship for the 14-20 Hawks.
“We all know it’s a volatile environment and that kind of thing, but you don’t want to lose people like him,” said Popovich recently, via Tom Orsborn of San Antonio Express-News. “It’s like losing a really good player in the draft or misjudging someone. He’s the kind of guy you can build a culture with. “
Pop has suggested that Atlanta will regret Lloyd Pierce’s resignation.
– Tom Orsborn (@tom_orsborn) March 2, 2021
The Hawks, at the time of writing, are ranked 11th in the Eastern Conference ranking, with Atlanta coming out of a 109-99 loss to the Miami Heat on Sunday night. Perhaps more importantly, the Hawks’ last loss was the team’s 11th loss of the season, after maintaining the lead in the fourth period. As Pierce and the Hawks were expected to do very important things in 2020-21, it appears that the guide was very short in Atlanta, as the aforementioned McMillan will take over as interim with the All-Star crash right there. .
Originally hired by the Hawks in 2018, Pierce will end his tenure in Atlanta with a record 63-120 on his credit, as the team lost the postseason in each of their two full seasons in charge.
