Report: Nets to part ways with Kevin Ollie and Ronnie Burrell

Brooklyn’s coaching staff will look different from top to bottom next season.

In this story:In what could have been a busy postseason run for the Brooklyn Nets is now a busy offseason that evidently gets a head start on the nine teams left in the NBA playoffs. This franchise knows what it wants at this point, which is to not fall short for yet another season in what is proclaimed as the weaker conference in the league. The first order of business for Nets GM Sean Marks was to shake up the coaching staff.

More than halfway through the 2023-24 campaign, Marks felt pressured to change the entire coaching staff, but just ended up parting ways with former Nets head coach Jacque Vaughn. Standing on a 129-226 coaching record, Vaughn became the interim head coach in the 2019-20 season after Kenny Atkitson’s departure. Despite injuries, the Nets managed to be one of the eight teams in the East to get to the playoffs, but only to get swept by the Toronto Raptors. Vaughn was someone that many thought would continue on as the head coach after exceeding expectations that year. However, during that same offseason, Steve Nash was brought in instead.

It was only a matter of time before Vaughn became the interim head coach of the Nets, but that was only after Nash’s stint. Kevin Ollie replaced Vaughn as the interim head coach in February, going 11-17 in Brooklyn’s last 28 games. This wasn’t convincing enough for the Nets to move forward with Ollie though. They are now all-in with the head coach of the Canadian National team, Jordi Fernandez, as their new head coach.

Fernandez told YES Network in April that the Nets were “going to put together a very good coaching staff that will have everything organized in the summer.”

Former Michigan standout Juwan Howard, Steve Hetzel and Jay Hernandez will join him on the new coaching staff, with Hetzel as the lead assistant coach. Meanwhile, Ronnie Burrell and Will Weaver will no longer be part of the Nets’ coaching staff. With the offseason not fully underway amongst all the teams in the NBA, it’s going to be very interesting to see what decisions Brooklyn will make in free agency and the draft.