San Antonio Spurs head coach, Gregg Popovich, tied the record for most regular-season wins on Monday night after a 117-110 win over the Los Angeles Lakers. He is tied with former boss and mentor, Don Nelson, at 1,335 wins and could surpass his mentor on Wednesday as Spurs face the Raptors.
Pop reached this milestone in 2,028 games, losing just 693 games, while Don Nelson took 2,398 games to reach the same mark. Don had a win percentage of 55%, while Pop had a delightful 66% win percentage.
What makes this feat even more remarkable is that Pop reached this milestone with just one team, San Antonio Spurs and has been with them for 26 years.
The President/Coach of Spurs, started his NBA coaching career in 1996, in which he won only a mere 17 games out of 64. The 73-year-old’s second season with Spurs saw improvement as he lost only 26 games in the regular season. In his third season itself, he clinched his first NBA Championship in the 1998-99 season.
Pop has 5 NBA championships to his name, starting in the 1998-99 season, he’s also won it in 2002-03, 2004-05, 2006-07, and finally the 2013-14 season. He’s been to the NBA Finals 6 times, and he clinched a title in five of those. He also won Gold Medal at the 2021 Olympics with the U.S Basketball team.
After winning the NBA Coach of the Year three times, Popovich was awarded the Red Auerbach Trophy in 2014, and in the same year, he won his fifth NBA Championship. On February 16, 2022, Pop surpassed Lenny Wilkens for second-most regular-season wins with 1,333 wins. He is one of the two coaches to win 1,000 games with one team in NBA history. On April 13, 2019, Popovich crossed Lenny Wilkens and became the coach with the most NBA wins (regular season and playoffs combined) in history.
