Rivals force you to elevate your game. Few in the history of the NBA know that better than Milwaukee Bucks head coach Jason Kidd.
At every stop in his career, Jason has been involved in the type of hard fought clashes that forced both he and his teammates as a player, and charges as a coach, to raise their level and reach new heights as a result.
It didn’t take long for this to happen in Milwaukee. Coach Kidd took over a talented team that was lacking direction and helped guide them to a postseason appearance in his first year as coach. But it was in the playoffs that Bucks, the youngest group to make the postseason, solidified themselves as a threat in what could be one of the biggest rivalries in the NBA in the coming years.
In the first round of the 2015 Eastern Conference playoffs, the Bucks and Bulls, two franchises close in proximity but without much recent history, waged an epic six-game battle. Though Chicago was heavily favored over the young Bucks, Milwaukee pushed their Windy City rivals to the limit, winning two contests in thrilling fashion, including a big Game 5 win at Chicago’s hostile United Center.
The Bucks ultimately lost the battle, but the competitive tenor of the entire series and the proximity of the two cities — less than a two-hour drive separates Milwaukee’s BMO Harris Bradley Center and Chicago’s United Center— may have created a rivalry that could last for years. To add to the tinder that started last year’s fire, Milwaukee made some remarkable offseason moves, showing that they are ready to compete with their rival among the elite in the East.
Fortunately for the young Bucks squad, they have a head coach who has been through it all as a player in the league, including some spectacular rivalry showdowns. As part of the NBA’s Rivalry Week, JasonKidd.com takes a look back at some of the best rivalries J-Kidd has been a part of during his career.
PHOENIX
After spending the first few years of his career on a Dallas Mavericks team that struggled to take that next step needed to compete at a high level and establish a rivalry, Jason was traded to the Phoenix Suns and it was there that he got one of his first true tastes of the bitter back-and-forth between NBA rivals.
During the 1996-97 season Jason joined a Suns squad that was already playoff-contending, one that — two years prior — was ousted in the first round of the postseason by the San Antonio Spurs. Jason’s arrival in Phoenix helped re-ignite that rivalry and, in a twist of fate, the Suns ended the regular season with the exact same record as San Antonio, 56-26.
That locked the two teams in a No. 4 vs. No. 5 seed matchup in the first round. San Antonio got the upper-hand with a Game 1 win but J-Kidd came through with a crucial double-double in Game 2 to deliver a victory for the Suns. However, the Spurs ultimately landed another big blow, ending Phoenix’s season early again by winning the next two games and taking the series 3-1.
Their paths didn’t cross in the 1999 playoffs, where the Suns were ousted by the Trailblazer and the Spurs went on to win the NBA title. But the year after, J-Kidd and Co. were ready to take on the champs. A similar scene was painted. The two teams split four regular-season matchups, each decided by single figures. This time the postseason came with San Antonio owning the No. 4 seed and Phoenix at the five.
A broken ankle suffered in late March left Jason questionable for the playoffs, but he wasn’t about to miss this opportunity. After sitting out the first three games of the series, he returned just in time for Phoenix, suiting up for a huge Game 4 in Phoenix. He tallied nine points and logged 10 assists as his team avoided a trip back toSan Antonio and clinched the series to finally exact revenge on the Spurs.
“Jason was a big difference,” San Antonio coach Gregg Popovich said after the game, “a huge difference. Big doesn’t do him justice, and not just because of the emotion. He played his fanny off.”
NEW JERSEY
After his time in Phoenix, Jason joined the New Jersey Nets, and he was an instant impact in the Garden State, turning a 26-win team in 2000-01 to a championship threat that won 52 games in his first year on the roster.
By the time he arrived in New Jersey, Jason had already made plenty of enemies on the court in the Western Conference, and he wasted little time doing the same in the East. The Boston Celtics were on a similar path to New Jersey at the time. Boston won just 36 games in the 2000-01 campaign, but like the Nets they roe quickly during the 01-02 campaign.
Both squads won their way through the first two rounds of the postseason and came head-to-head in an epic Conference Finals showdown where J-Kidd led his Nets to cut down the rise of the Celtics.
The C’s were led by a lethal scoring duo of Paul Pierce and Antoine Walker. However, they had no answer for J-Kidd. He tallied three triple-doubles in the series, narrowly missing a fourth in Game 5, where he had 19 points, nine assists and nine rebounds. A thorn in Boston’s side throughout the six-game series, Jason averaged 17.5 points, 10.2 assists and 11.2 rebounds as the Nets advanced.
“They did a tremendous job tonight,” Pierce said afterward. “You can’t take anything away from Jason Kidd. He’s a tremendous player. He does so much for that club. What more can you say? They deserve it.”
The following year, the Celtics came calling again, this time in the conference quarterfinals. But once again, they just couldn’t handle J-Kidd. This time, the New Jersey point guard averaged 19 points, nine assists and nine rebounds in a quieter series, but he spoke the loudest when it mattered the most.
Jason and Co. went into the hostile TD Garden—named the Fleet Center at the time—for Game 4 of the series, already in command with a 3-0 series lead. Celtics fans spat vitriol at Jason and his team all night trying to keep the Nets from eliminating their team on its home floor, but J-Kidd coolly directed his team to a thrilling 110-101 double-overtime win, tallying 29 points, eight dimes and 10 boards along the way.
“The crowd was great,” Jason said with a smile after clinching the sweep. “They try to get under your skin. I didn’t hear that much. It’s always great, no matter what the fans say or do, there’s still a game to be played and we can’t forget that.”
DALLAS
Winning their bitter battles with the Celtics helped push the Nets to back-to-back Eastern Conference titles, but New Jersey couldn’t get over the hump in the Finals, where they lost one-sided series with the Los Angeles Lakers and San Antonio Spurs in consecutive seasons.
It wasn’t until Jason returned to the team that drafted him, the Dallas Mavericks, that he got the best of a rivalry at the pinnacle of the sport.
Situated in Texas, where there are two other NBA teams—the Houston Rockets and the Spurs—the Mavs have a pair of built-in rivals.
But one of their most meaningful rivalries was created at the NBA’s highest level.
The rivalry between the Mavs and the Miami Heat began long after J-Kidd left Dallas the first time in 1996, but before he returned in 2008. It was born in the 2006 playoffs, where Dallas defeated the Memphis Grizzlies, another rival in the Spurs, and then the Suns to make it to the Finals for the first time in franchise history. However, without Jason at point, the Mavs were no match for the Heat, who were led by the prolific duo of Shaquille O’Neal and Dwyane Wade.
Five years later, the Mavs were back with J-Kidd at the helm and though wasn’t there for the start the rivalry, he was the one to help finish it.
By adding LeBron James and Chris Bosh alongside Wade, Miami had built a team that was eyeing multiple titles. But Jason and the veteran Mavs were standing in the way. J-Kidd didn’t average a triple-double like in his rivalry bouts with Boston, but he was integral part on both ends of the floor. The six-game series win for Dallas culminated with a 105-95 win, and J-Kidd’s nine-point, eight-assist effort helped give the Mavs revenge on the Heat, not to mention deliver the franchise its first title.
“It’s not real right now,” Jason said after the Game 6 win. “Just understanding all the battles with the Heat. It’s been a long journey for me: 17 years. I had an opportunity in 2003 to win a championship, but I was on the other end, we lost to the Spurs. But my teammates, their character and will to come every day and get better, they deserve all the credit. I’m just happy to be at the right place at the right time.”
NEW YORK
After leaving the Mavericks in 2012, Jason went on to play just one more season in the NBA, with the 2012-13 New York Knicks, before becoming coach for the Brooklyn Nets in 2013.
But in that brief time spent in New York, Jason became an integral part of the newly formed Borough Battle between New York and Brooklyn, where the Nets moved from New Jersey in 2012.
His first exposure to that newly formed rivalry came as a player, when, in his first ever game at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center, J-Kidd buried a tie-breaking three with 24 seconds left in the game to lift the Knicks to a 100-97 win over the Nets. It was the type of shot a big-time player makes in a big-time rivalry game and it gave New York their first win over their bitter borough rivals in Brooklyn.
“That’s why we went and got him,” teammate Carmelo Anthony said. “We know how much of a big-time player he is, especially coming down the stretch, how smart of a player he is… he came up big-time for us tonight.”
J-Kidd helped the Knicks accomplish big things in that lone season in New York, helping them to their first 50-win season in more than a decade and a playoff run that got beyond the first round for the first time since 1999.
But when the season ended, Jason made the shocking move to hang up his sneakers and transition immediately to coaching, taking the head coach job on the other side of the rivalry in Brooklyn. In his lone year there, he helped lead the Nets to the playoffs while the Knicks sat at home for the postseason.
During that season and into the playoffs, Coach Kidd’s Nets quickly built a rivalry with the Toronto Raptors. The two sides split their four regular season meetings before they met again in the first round of the playoffs.
In that playoff series, the two squads locked up in a seven-game battle that left a mark in both cities. Brooklyn won Game 1 in Toronto and held a 2-1 series lead after three games, but losses in Game 4 in Brooklyn and Game 5 in Toronto pushed the Nets to the brink. It was here though that the rivalry hit a fever pitch and Brooklyn channeled the clutch drive of their coach. They battled back to win Game 6 in Brooklyn, sending the series back to Toronto for an incredible Game 7 that came down to the final seconds with a defensive stand by the Nets that clinched a game and series victory.
“For us to come in here and get a win, that just shows the character,” Jason said. “It also shows how good we can be.”
With that win, Jason became the first rookie coach ever to win a Game 7 playoff game on the road.
He took that experience on to Milwaukee last season, where he and the Bucks quickly cultivated a rivalry with the Bulls that could last quite a while. During Rivalry Week, the Bucks have been asking fans to pick some of the team’s other rivals, with a chance to win tickets to games against those teams this season as a prize for the best choices.
All the teams that Jason has battled with as a player and in his brief stint so far as a coach are among the options. But no matter who his team feuds with next, the Bucks and Milwaukee fans can rest a little easier knowing that they have a leader with the poise and focus to drive a team and elevate their game the way they must to reach the highest level of the sport and engage in those bitter rivalries he’s become so familiar with.
