Canadian Roundup: Evaluating Nick Nurse’s Tenure + Looking Ahead

This wasn’t how I envisioned my 2023 World Cup coverage starting.

If you haven’t heard by now, Nick Nurse is now the former head coach of Canada’s Senior Men’s National Team (SMNT), replaced by Sacramento Kings assistant coach Jordi Fernandez. There’s been some confusion, but consensus reporting is Nick Nurse’s decision to step down was one that was heavily influenced by his new job with the Philadelphia 76ers.

Nick Nurse’s Canada Basketball Tenure: Potential That Never Materialized

A little over four years ago, Nick Nurse was named the head coach of Canada’s SMNT in very similar circumstances to Fernandez’s hire; late June, with a little over a month before training camp opened for the FIBA World Cup (WC). Fresh off of winning the 1st championship in franchise history with the Toronto Raptors, the hire of Nurse was seen as a monumental one for the program. One of the world’s brightest basketball minds would be leading Canada and it’s “Golden Generation” of NBA players, hopefully to heights not reached by the program since the early 2000’s.

What followed in the 2019 FIBA World Cup was anything but a success. A total of 19 athletes were invited to training camp, 7 of which were NBA players. Stars Jamal Murray and RJ Barrett attended training camp but were not active participants as they were sidelined due to injuries. Still, despite not having the best top-end NBA talent, Canada seemed primed to finally dip into their NBA depth chart and form a strong WC contender.

Instead, one by one, the NBA training camp invitees dropped out. Olynyk injured his right knee in the 1st exhibition game of the campaign against Nigeria. Boucher left the team due to personal reasons. Brissett, who travelled all the way to Australia with the SMNT in the final parts of the WC exhibition campaign, was ruled out with a knee injury on the eve of the 2019 WC. Left with only 2 NBA players and drawn into the Group of Death (Australia, Lithuania, Jordan were Canada’s group mates) Canada limped to a 2-3 record and finished 21st overall (32 teams participated in the WC). Canada’s SMNT had failed to directly qualify for the Olympics once again. But all was not lost. Canada would have one more shot to qualify for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics in a last-chance FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournament.

Covid-19 delayed this Olympic Qualifying Tournament by a year to the summer of 2021. Once again, with Nick Nurse at the helm, hopes were high for the SMNT to finally end the Olympic drought. Canada Basketball even successfully won a bid to host this last chance tournament on home soil in Victoria, BC. This time around, 21 athletes accepted invites to training camp, a number which was quickly whittled down to 19 when training camp actually began. Khem Birch, Dillon Brooks, Brandon Clarke, Kelly Olynyk, Tristan Thompson all were absent from training camp despite accepting invites.

This time the NBA turnout was much stronger. Headlined by the return of Andrew Wiggins to the SMNT, there was palpable excitement for the talent and depth on the team. This time though, Canada played a total of 0 exhibition tune ups before the Olympic Qualifying Tournament began (1 game was planned against the CEBL All-Stars but it was nixed due to Covid-19). Perhaps the pandemic played a role in this, but after re-watching the tournament as preparation for my coverage of this summer’s World Cup, I can tell you Canada severely lacked chemistry and complexity in the offensive sets they ran. Talent alone got the SMNT into the semi-finals, where they ultimately fell to the Czech Republic, a strong, cohesive and well-coached team that had finished 6th at the 2019 World Cup 2 years prior. Another Olympics cycle had passed with nothing to show for the SMNT.

Despite this latest disappointment, Nick Nurse’s contract as head coach was extended to the end of the 2024 Olympic cycle. With the contract extension came an open letter from Nurse penned to Canada Basketball fans. Nurse pointed to the success of cohesive and consistent sports organizations and programs as a model that Canada Basketball wanted to follow, declaring that “chemistry, camaraderie and continuity can – and often will trump talent”. Hard to argue with that sentiment when you consider a truly coherent basketball program from top to bottom like Spain, whose seen its own “Golden Generation” age out, and yet continues to find success at the highest level (Spain is the reigning FIBA World Cup and EuroBasket champions and currently ranked #1 in FIBA’s Men’s Rankings).

Nurse then went on to promise, “my first and biggest task immediately at hand is to begin to build that kind of continuity in Canada”. Nurse and Canada basketball announced in that letter that they would be seeking a 3 summer commitment (from the summer of 2022 to the summer of 2024) from all players in order to build continuity and chemistry that previous editions of the SMNT sorely lacked. Along with newly appointed Canada Basketball President & CEO Mike Bartlett and Canada Basketball GM Rowan Barrett, the leadership team had one focus – build a strong core of players for this Olympic cycle.

This summer core idea was certainly an ambitious task. A drastic cultural reset of sort for Canada Basketball. On May 24th, 2022, Canada Basketball finally unveiled the 14 athletes who had made the long-term commitment. If you’re interested, I wrote a piece breaking down how each member of the Summer Core was playing earlier in the year right here at Raptors Republic. With the amount of high-level talent that committed, this core idea seemed to be off to a good start.

The first real test of this Summer Core idea came last summer in the 2023 FIBA WC Qualifiers. Off the back of Canada’s strong depth of Euro pros (Kyle Wiltjer, Kyle Alexander, the Scrubb brothers, etc.) Canada had raced to a 4-0 start in previous Qualifier windows. For the two summer windows in early July 2022 and late August 2022 (the 2 windows NBA players were available for) 8 of the 14 members of the Summer Core played, with the rest (aside from Dillon Brooks) reporting to training camp to gain familiarity with Nurse’s offensive principles and defensive schemes.

For me, the initial returns on the Summer Core were a resounding success despite not having full participation. Canada went 4-0 overall in these two windows (without any exhibition games played, which is typical for these qualifiers) and the Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Kelly Olynyk connection was as lethal as I projected it to be (I am of the opinion that Olynyk is a top 3 most important player on this team, top 2 if Jamal Murray does not play). Their offensive skillsets harmonized perfectly to carry the offensive load and the cast of role players surrounding them each brought something that could be maximized in lower volumes. Canada’s defense was long and active, and the buy-in from all players was evident. This defensive possession vs Argentina stands out for me. From stopping Argentina in early transition to the numerous crisp rotations and extra effort closeouts from Robertson, Joseph, Powell, Olynyk and SGA, this was the possession that coaches dream about.

Which leads us to this week, the end of Nick Nurse’s tenure with Canada Basketball. Overall when looking back at his 4 year stretch as head coach, it’s hard to say it was truly successful. Nurse’s momentum and time with Canada Basketball was spoiled with inconsistent player participation and lack of thorough preparation and practice before high leverage games. How much of the blame does Canada Basketball’s leadership get? How much does Nurse get? How much do the players get? I’m unsure of the appropriate proportion of blame to attribute to each party here and I’m not sure it really matters. At the end of the day the goal of qualifying for the Olympics was just out of reach once again.

You *Might* Reap What You Sow

My instant reaction to Nurse’s departure from Canada Basketball was extreme disappointment for one main reason. So much of the past 2 years has been focused on building continuity with the SMNT. Even with the rotation of players coming in and out with each window, there was a concerted effort to create continuity via the Winter Core (an unofficial name given to the core of Euro players who have shown up consistently in WC Qualifiers) and the Summer Core. And where there was an even more concerted effort to build continuity and stability was with the coaching staff.

When Nick Nurse was unavailable to coach in winter WC Qualifier windows, former Raptors assistant coach (and member of the Nurse coaching tree) Nate Bjorkgren took over head coaching duties and maintained the same general offensive sets and defensive schemes with the SMNT. Here’s an example of Canada’s Winter Core running “Horns Flare” in 2023, which is something the Raptors ran in the same year (shoutout to Samson Folk who narrates over the 2nd clip in the video below).

The AmeriCup in September 2022 was much of the same, with another former Raptors assistant coach, Nathaniel Mitchell, maintaining general offensive and defensive principles as the head coach. Mitchell led the SMNT to a surprising 4th place finish with a roster meant to develop future Winter Core members (the lone exception was Dalano Banton’s inclusion). Here’s the AmeriCup team running “Motion Strong Wheel”, the same action Nurse ran in 2019 for Brady Heslip with the SMNT.

All this to say, there was a sense of connectiveness and organizational continuity within Canada’s SMNT. A “plug-and-play” feeling that all editions of the SMNT took part in cultivating with Nick Nurse and his coaching tree at the helm. If you can’t control player participation, maintaining stability in the coaching staff is one way to try and develop continuity and cohesiveness, which I felt was done extremely successfully the past couple of years. The offensive set and defensive scheme consistency across windows was certainly a contributing factor to Canada finishing with an 11-1 record in the 2023 WC Qualifiers, which ranked first in the Americas. There were signs that this new approach was working and it’s a shame Nurse’s departure may have stopped this momentum.

My immense disappointment has turned into more of a hopeful optimism as more news has come to light. Josh Lewenberg reported that both Nate Bjorkgren and Nathaniel Mitchell would stay on the coaching staff as assistants to newly appointed Jordi Fernandez. Canada Basketball is clearly trying to commit to this continuity approach as much as they can, trying to reap the benefits of the seeds they had sowed all the way back in 2021.

Looking Ahead to a New Era

From everything I’ve read and heard, Jordi Fernandez looks like a fantastic and well-qualified candidate to lead Canada’s SMNT this summer. He has a bevy of coaching experience in the NBA as well as in the FIBA game. Fernandez has even written research papers on basketball! He’s clearly a bright basketball mind and tactician, which is generally something I am supportive of. If you’re into the basketball X’s and O’s stay tuned for more of my 2023 WC coverage as I dig deeper into Fernandez’s offensive principles and defensive schemes.

In terms of player commitments in the Core 14, there’s been reports that they “remain intact” according to Michael Grange of Sportsnet. Fernandez also seems to have some strong prior relationships with Canadians Jamal Murray (former associate head coach in Denver from 2016-2022) and Trey Lyles (current associate head coach in Sacramento), so perhaps they feel more inclined to participate.

To me, projecting a roster for the 2023 WC is an impossible task (which is the main reason why I have stayed away from making an official prediction myself), especially now given the new instability with the program. I honestly have no idea how this turns out. If you were asking me what I prefer, I would lean to sticking with the Core 14 as much as possible, supplementing absences with Winter Core mainstays (Kyle Alexander, Kyle Wiltjer, Kassius Robertson, Phil Scrubb and Thomas Scrubb would be my ideal candidates) and potentially some other NBA guys (Andrew Nembhard is my favourite pick as a replacement candidate). These guys have shown their loyalty to the program, but more importantly are already familiar with Canada’s strategic infrastructure.

This summer was always going to be of monumental importance to Canada Basketball. A chance to end the Olympics drought and officially mark the start of Canada’s golden era of international basketball. Make no mistake though, Canada Basketball has entered a new era, just not the one many, including myself, may have expected this summer.