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Warriors' Head Coach Steve Kerr wins 2015-16 KIA NBA Coach of the Year Award

Steve Kerr

Golden State Warriors’ Head Coach Steve Kerr, whose team won NBA record – 73 wins this season, was named the 2015-16 KIA NBA Coach of the Year, the NBA announced on Tuesday morning. Kerr becomes the third Warriors Head Coach in franchise history to be named Coach of the Year, after Don Nelson in 1991-92 and Alex Hannum in 1963-64.

The NBA’s official twitter handle was the first to announce the news:

Balloting results

From a panel of 130 sportswriters and broadcasters, Steve Kerr received 381 total votes (64 first place votes). He was followed by Portland Trailblazers Head Coach Terry Stotts who totalled 335 points (37 first place votes). 67 win San Antonio Spurs Head Coach Gregg Popovich came third with 166 points (10 first place votes).

Every first place vote is worth five points, second place vote three points and a third place votes is worth one point. Here is the complete balloting results, courtesy of @MarcJSpearsESPN:


An award earned and well deserved

Kerr in his second season as the Head Coach of the Warriors has amassed a regular season record of 140-24 with a winning percentage of 85.3%, the highest ever by a Coach when he was named Coach of the Year. En route to breaking the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls record of 72 wins, Kerr’s Warriors set and broke many other notable records this past season.

Golden State recorded the most road wins in NBA history with their 34, surpassing the 33 win mark set by the Bulls’. Over the course of the season, the team also had a 54 game home winning streak (18 to cap off last season). Under Kerr’s leadership, the team has gone 39-2 at the Oracle Arena for a second season in a row. Last but not the least, the Warriors set the 73 win record by never losing consecutive games, a feat never achieved in league history.

Kerr’s Warriors excelled on both ends of the floor.

They led the league in offensive efficiency with a rating of 112.5 per 100 possessions, this comes as no surprise as the team led the league in a majority of the offensive stats. Warriors led the league in points scored (average of 114.9), three-pointers made (1,077), field goal percentage (48.7%), three-point field goal percentage (41.6%, second best in NBA history) and assists (28.9). Defensively the Warriors ranked tied 4th for defensive efficiency with a rating of 100.9 per 100 possessions.

Despite all the success that Warriors achieved this season, part of the credit must go to Associate Head Coach Luke Walton, who stepped up and coached the team in the absence of Kerr, who was still healing from two off-season back surgeries. Walton coached the team through 43 games with a record of 39-4, which included the 24 game win streak to start the season pushing their overall tally to 28 games, the second longest win streak of all time. 

Here’s are the top Golden State Warriors’ highlights crunched into five minutes:

 

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