Former Indiana Pacers head coach Nate McMillan doesn’t anticipate pursuing a head coaching job for next season.
“I’m going to take this year and just look at things,” McMillan told Bob Kravitz of The Athletic. “A lot has changed, the league and the game have changed, so I’ll take this year and see what happens, but I won’t get back into it this season.”
McMillan isn’t bitter about his exit, but he was somewhat confused after he recently signed a one-year contract extention.
“I thought about it and said, ‘Even though we hadn’t started the playoffs, I really thought at the time we were going to advance,'” McMillan said. “I had all my players (except Jeremy Lamb). Domas was there. I always thought Victor [Oladipo] was going to play. We had everybody and I really thought we could get out of the first round. So I signed that extension thinking, ‘OK, next year we’ll be healthy and I’ll give it one more try.'”
McMillan continued, “And then we get down to the bubble and Domas has his injury and it was like, ‘Ohhhhh-kay.’ But I know what I said to myself and told the organization, for me, it was about getting out of the first round, so when the decision was made yesterday, I understood.”
The 56-year-old was fired on Aug. 26 after four seasons as the Pacers head coach.
He had a record of 183-136 in those four seasons.
