{"id":17860,"date":"2025-05-08T05:54:25","date_gmt":"2025-05-08T05:54:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/17860\/"},"modified":"2025-05-08T05:54:25","modified_gmt":"2025-05-08T05:54:25","slug":"will-hardy-intends-to-coach-utah-jazz-until-they-win-an-nba-title-deseret-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/17860\/","title":{"rendered":"Will Hardy intends to coach Utah Jazz until they win an NBA title \u2013 Deseret News"},"content":{"rendered":"

It seemed like it was inevitable that Utah Jazz head coach Will Hardy would end up in the rumor mill, one way or another.<\/p>\n

More and more recently there have been rumblings, and quietly held conversations among those around the league, positing that Hardy could be on a short list to be Gregg Popovich\u2019s successor in San Antonio.<\/p>\n

There are two caveats to keep in mind when considering some of these rumors. First, Hardy is under contract with the Jazz through the 2026-27 season.<\/p>\n

He originally signed a four-year deal with the team in 2022 that included a team option for a fifth season, and the Jazz picked up that option before the start of the 2024-25 campaign.<\/p>\n

Second, we don\u2019t know when Popovich is going to hang it up. He suffered a stroke in November, which led to assistant Mitch Johnson taking over for the remainder of the season, but there\u2019s been no news on if Popovich intends on returning next season.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m committed here. I\u2019m under contract here. I told Ryan (Smith) and Danny (Ainge) and Justin (Zanik) that I want to be here for as long as I can.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014 \u00a0Jazz coach Will Hardy<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the thing, though. The Spurs job is not the only one that people have floated as a potential second stop for Hardy. The Jazz\u2019s head coach is among the youngest in the league but has quickly garnered widespread respect.<\/p>\n

Night in and night out, opposing coaches praise Hardy for being one of the smartest, brightest and best coaches in the league, and that\u2019s despite him being at the helm of the tanking Jazz<\/a> over the past three seasons.<\/p>\n

But, Hardy did his best on Monday during the team\u2019s end-of-season media availability to stop any rumors and scoffed at the idea that he would want to relocate in order to coach a winning or rising team, rather than one that is at the very bottom of the NBA.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m all-in, man,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m not going anywhere. That\u2019s a crazy scenario that you just brought up. I don\u2019t see a world where that would happen, but it doesn\u2019t matter.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m committed here. I\u2019m under contract here. I told Ryan (Smith) and Danny (Ainge) and Justin (Zanik) that I want to be here for as long as I can.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Will Hardy, head coach of the Utah Jazz, speaks at an end of season press conference at the Zions Bank Basketball Center in Salt Lake City on Monday, April 14, 2025 | Scott G Winterton, Deseret News <\/p>\n

And, as if expecting that he would need to go even farther to really drive the point home, Hardy pointed to the longterm goals of the Jazz, beyond the tanking and the rebuilding efforts.<\/p>\n

He wants people to believe that he fully intends on being the head coach in Utah when the tides turn for the Jazz.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe goal for me is to put up a banner at Delta Center,\u201d Hardy said. \u201cI try to operate (with that in mind) every day, not just with my job or coaching our team, but how I try to be present in the community.<\/p>\n

\u201cLike, I\u2019m putting my roots here in Utah. It\u2019s not even a question for me. In some ways, my conviction has never been stronger in terms of wanting to execute our long-term vision and ultimately win a championship.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of course, the decision is not completely Hardy\u2019s. He needs to have the confidence of Smith, Ainge and Zanik, as well as the respect and confidence of the players he coaches, but it seems like all of those boxes are checked for the time being as well.<\/p>\n

Every single player that was asked Monday said that they fully had Hardy\u2019s back and believed that he was not just a good coach but a great one.<\/p>\n

The players pointed to his ability to connect on a deep level with them and show that he cares about them beyond the context of what they do on the basketball court or even in a Jazz jersey.<\/p>\n

He also earns the respect of the players in that he doesn\u2019t show favoritism. Despite contract differences and years of experience between players, those on the Jazz roster truly believe that everyone is being held to the same standard.<\/p>\n

\"\"Justin Zanik, general manager of the Utah Jazz, speaks at an end of season press conference at the Zions Bank Basketball Center in Salt Lake City on Monday, April 14, 2025 | Scott G Winterton, Deseret News <\/p>\n

Those are a few of the reasons that give the Jazz\u2019s front office reason to believe they made the right choice in hiring Hardy to usher them through these rebuilding years, but do they think that Hardy will still be the right choice once the Jazz are actually trying to contend?<\/p>\n

\u201cAbsolutely,\u201d Zanik said, without skipping a beat. \u201cIf I had a vote, I honestly would cast my vote for coach of the year for Will Hardy.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s an incredible teacher, incredible communicator, a great partner … even though we\u2018re a young team and we didn\u2019t always do everything right, and things could get sloppy, he got them to play hard and to be invested for the season, no matter what the result was.\u201d<\/p>\n

Obviously there\u2019s no crystal ball and there\u2019s no way to know if the players will still be invested in three years or when the team looks completely different and has different types of players and personalities, but for now, Hardy says that he is here to stay.<\/p>\n

And in a league wherein confidence in coaching seems fleeting, Hardy stands out as having strong and unwavering support from the front office, ownership and the players.<\/p>\n

\"\"Ryan Smith laughs as he talks with his wife, Ashley, both owners of the Utah Jazz, during a game against the Minnesota Timberwolves held at the Delta Center in Salt Lake City on Friday, Feb. 28, 2025. | Isaac Hale, Deseret News <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It seemed like it was inevitable that Utah Jazz head coach Will Hardy would end up in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17861,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3785],"tags":[7,423,6,723,422,427,3972],"class_list":{"0":"post-17860","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-utah-jazz","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-jazz","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-news-feed-national","12":"tag-utah","13":"tag-utah-jazz","14":"tag-utahjazz"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/114470667284416929","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17860","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17860"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17860\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17861"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}