After a big shakeup and trading away their star player Joe Johnson, the Atlanta Hawks finished sixth in the Eastern Conference and suffered a first round outser at the hands of the Indiana Pacers. While some may consider their season underwhelming, others consider it a success when you look at what they had to work with. Still more shakeups are coming as Josh Smith becomes an unrestricted free agent and will likely walk and they’re likely going to let go of head coach Larry Drew. Who do they want as replacements? Read more after the jump.
From Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports:
The Atlanta Hawks are aggressively pursuing Stan Van Gundy for the franchise’s head-coaching job, league sources told Yahoo! Sports.
General manager Danny Ferry has made Van Gundy his top target to replace Larry Drew, sources said.
There has been contact between Ferry and Van Gundy, but the two sides have yet to meet in person.
The Hawks plan to make a hard push for free-agent center Dwight Howardon July 1, and there’s some belief that Van Gundy could turn out to be a benefit in recruiting Howard back to his hometown.
Howard has expressed some sentiment that he better appreciates Van Gundy as a head coach, despite their clashes together in Orlando that ultimately led to the coach’s firing after the 2011-12 season.
Howard has said that his season with the Lakers was a nightmare but that doesn’t mean he won’t return. The Lakers can offer him one year and $30 million more than anyone else, plus he’ll have control over the team once Kobe retires which is likely in a year or two. The Hawks only solace is that Howard is from Atlanta and the slight chance he may want to reunite with Van Gundy although I’m skeptical on how much he wants that. This is just one of many articles to come on his and Van Gundy’s offseason situation.
