Tom Thibodeau, responsible for the resurrection of the New York Knicks, who reached the play-offs after eight years of scarcity and half-mast performance, has been named the best coach of the regular season, the NBA announced on Monday.
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This is the second time that the 63-year-old coach has been so honored, after having been so during the 2010-2011 season with the Chicago Bulls. This is the first time that a technician has received this award twice at the end of his first season in two different clubs.
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Thibodeau (351 pts) leads by a short margin Monty Williams (340 pts), who led the Phoenix Suns to second place in the Western Conference, qualifying his team for play-offs that they had narrowly missed the season past. Quin Snyder, the coach of Utah Jazz, who finished with the best record in the championship, is third (161 pts).
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Returning to New York, where he had been an assistant coach between 1996 and 2003, Thibodeau has revived a dying franchise by reconnecting it with a combative and defensive team identity that it had lost in recent years.
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The result was a surprising fourth place in the Eastern Conference (41 wins, 31 losses), after a successful final sprint, as the Knicks have won sixteen of their last twenty matches. Last season ended with a poor record (21-45).
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The Knicks were nevertheless taken out of the play-offs, despite the home advantage, by the Atlanta Hawks (loss 4-1).
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