Knicks, coach Mike Brown finalizing deal: New York closing in on veteran to replace Tom Thibodeau, per reports

The New York Knicks are working to hire Mike Brown as their next head coach, according to ESPN. Brown has been offered the job and the two sides are trying to finalize the deal, per multiple reports. The decision marks the end of a lengthy process that followed New York’s surprising decision to fire former Coach of the Year Tom Thibodeau following a six-game loss to the Indiana Pacers in the Eastern Conference finals. 

The Knicks explored a number of candidates, but ultimately landed on Brown to lead them into the 2025-26 season. They fired Thibodeau in early June, days after their playoff exit against the Pacers. Thibodeau won 56.5% of his regular-season games as Knicks head coach, going 226-174 overall over five seasons. The Knicks were 51-31 in the 2024-25 season and earned the East’s No. 3 seed.

The Knicks were reportedly interested in several current head coaches, including Ime Udoka (Rockets), Jason Kidd (Mavericks), Billy Donovan (Bulls) and Quin Snyder (Hawks) but never appeared close to prying any of them away from their teams. Taylor Jenkins, Pelicans assistant James Borrego and Timberwolves assistant Micah Nori, along with Brown, reportedly interviewed for the job. The Knicks also reached out to South Carolina women’s coach Dawn Staley, but she was reportedly not a finalist.

Brown has had a relatively unusual head coaching career. Rather than starting out with a young team and growing slowly, he was thrown into the fire as the head coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers right as LeBron James began to grow into a superstar. He took the Cavaliers to the NBA Finals in 2007, but after several playoff disappointments in the aftermath, he was fired moving into the 2010 offseason in which James left Cleveland. 

One year later, he took on one of the few jobs in all of basketball that comes with more pressure: the Los Angeles Lakers. He replaced Phil Jackson for the 2011-12 campaign and attempted to make the most of what remained of Kobe Bryant’s prime. They reached the second round of the postseason in his only full season on the job, but he was fired following a 1-4 start to the 2012-13 season. He proceeded to coach one more year in Cleveland, but was again fired right before James returned.

From there, he spent six seasons as an assistant under Steve Kerr with the Golden State Warriors. The Warriors are, in many ways, a team the Knicks are hoping to emulate. Two of Thibodeau’s biggest weaknesses as a coach were his relatively stale offense and his hesitance to use his bench. The Warriors run a unique offense built around motion and passing, and their philosophy is “strength in numbers.”

Brown took the lessons he learned in Golden State to the Sacramento, where he led the Kings to their only playoff appearance in 19 years. At the time, the Kings posted the most efficient offense in NBA history to get there. They pushed the Warriors to seven games in the first round, and were it not for a hand injury suffered by De’Aaron Fox and a 50-point Game 7 explosion by Stephen Curry, the Kings may have won that series.

However, normalcy has eluded the Kings for two decades, and sure enough, their dysfunction caught up with Brown in the years that followed. Sacramento’s 2023-24 season, on paper, was fairly similar to the preceding 2022-23 campaign. They won 46 games compared to the 48 they’d won a year prior, but a tight Western Conference dropped them from a No. 3 seed to a No. 9 seed. They missed the playoffs from there, and following a 13-18 start to last season that included several disappointing late-game losses, the Kings fired him and promoted Doug Christie to head coach.

Though Brown has never won a championship as a head coach, he is a two-time Coach of the Year (2009 and 2023) who is no stranger to the scrutiny that will come with his new job. Expectations are going to be enormous for New York next season. With the Pacers and Celtics seemingly out of the Eastern Conference running following the Achilles tears suffered by their best players, the Knicks see a clearer path to the NBA Finals than they’ve ever had before. They ultimately decided Thibodeau was not the man to lead them on that path, so now, New York is betting its title hopes on Brown.