Giving Credit Where It’s Due: Randy Wittman’s Success In The NBA Playoffs

By John Cannady | Apr 22, 2015

There have been many posts online and print with more than a few Washington Wizards fans calling for Randy Wittman’s job during his tenure as head coach (including this very site, and this article on Grantland).

I’m in the minority of Wizards fans that think Wittman has done a good job changing the culture and is building a team that is in contention to come out of the East this year.

Flashing back to the 2013-2014 season for a minute, the Wizards had a stacked starting five that included an All-Star, freak athlete starting at point guard (John Wall), a multi-talented (but moody) big man (Nene), and a young sharpshooter that reminded everyone of future Hall-of-Famer Ray Allen (Bradley Beal).

But the Wizards had an up-and-down season, and hovered around the .500 mark for the majority of the year before going on a five game winning streak and capturing the 5^th spot in the Eastern Conference Playoffs.

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This would break a 5-year drought from the playoffs for the Wizards and give the fans that have stuck with Washington through some trying times (ahem…JaVale McGee) some hope for the future.

While some of Wittman’s play-calling leaves little to the imagination: long twos, predictable post passes/plays and end of shot clock plays, the players seem to enjoy the system and enjoy Wittman himself.

Only a handful of times did a player mention that the offense needed some work (which was recently) and that player was Marcin Gortat when he was going through a tough second half stretch of the season, post-mohawk.

The thing that Wittman and his staff needed to shore up to make the Wizards formidable going into the playoffs was the rotation.

Because Wall and Beal are so young, casual fans thought that the Wizards were a young team last year, when in fact; they were stocked with mainly veterans.

In the 2013-2014 season, Randy Wittman had the luxury of sitting certain guys without consequence and tinkering with who should get what minutes. He occasionally would sit Nene for long stretches at a time while letting Drew Gooden and Al Harrington get some extended time on the court at the 4 spot.

However, the rotation this season has been much less fluid and head scratching. Sixth man Otto Porter would play big minutes one game and play well, but then not see the floor the next game. Usually Wittman would blame it on ‘bad matchups’ and told everyone not to read too much into it.

Wittman also, for some reason, would inexplicably sit his $60 million dollar man in Gortat for the whole 4^th quarter in a few games this season and it winded up costing the team in a crucial late season game against the Indiana Pacers.

Indiana point guard George Hill drove to the hole and put in the game winner without the rim protection that Gortat probably would have provided had he been on the floor. Russell Westbrook and the Oklahoma City Thunder prevailed in a similar fashion earlier in the year with Gortat not on the floor. You can see Gortat’s frustration below:

With all of his shortcomings on the offense on full display, Wittman’s main positive attribute that he has brought to the franchise has been his ability to implement a defense to get the team to focus on that end of the floor.

The Wizards are one of the best defensive teams in the NBA, and perhaps the best defender on the floor, John Wall, has continuously credited Wittman’s defensive schemes. With Trevor Ariza anchoring the defense last year, the Wizards were able to play excellent help defense and routinely out rebounded the opposing team by a large margin (Game 5 of the Washington/Indiana playoff series was a good example of this).

The transition from Ariza and the good team defense has carried over to the team this year. Again, the team hit a rough patch during the month of February and into March, but has since responded nicely.

After the first few games in the playoffs, the team looks re-focused and are thriving on Wittman’s trademark style of play: great defense and taking what the other team gives you on offense.

I do believe that one of the main overlooked keys for Wittman to be successful is having someone else play ‘bad cop’ to his ‘good cop’ act.

For the last few seasons, his main lieutenant on the sidelines was former point guard Sam Cassell.

Cassell was as assistant coach responsible for ‘coaching up’ the guards on the team and is credited with helping Wall and Beal become one of the best backcourts in the league.

This year however, instead of a coach, it came in the form of Paul Pierce.

Washington signed Pierce in the off season as a replacement for the void Trevor Ariza left after signing with the Houston Rockets.

Pierce has been known to bring grit, swagger, and clutch play most of his career in Boston and last season with the Brooklyn Nets.

All season long you could see Pierce giving guys a dirty look or a comment on a missed defensive assignment or sub par play. Never being one to shy away from speaking his mind, Pierce just gave Beal/Wall/Porter a wake up call out in the media with his interview with Jackie McMullan on ESPN.com (story).

The shots from the story seem to have landed as the three young players have led the way in the two playoff victories so far. You can also add Pierce to the list of players that like Wittman and think that he just plays the long game rather than appease the fanbase with small victories. Wittman has made history becoming the first coach to win their first 7 out of 8 games on the road in the playoffs.

That is an impressive feat seeing that the Wizards have been the lower seed in their recent playoff runs. Judging by the online chatter, the resting of players, and the late season losses, many observing the team from the outside looking in, basketball watchers (and Wizards fans) again thought ‘Here were go again….this season is #sowizards’.

But it looks like ole Randy Wittman and the Wizards were pulling off the rope-a-dope act and has had one of the most impressive showings in the NBA so far.

Next: Unsung Heroes: Otto and Gooden Continue Contributing

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