Don Nelson

Donald Arvid Nelson — known to the basketball world simply as "Nellie" — was one of the most original minds the game of basketball has ever produced. Born on May 15, 1940, in Muskegon, Michigan, he grew up on his grandfather's farm near Sherrard, Illinois, where he first learned to shoot a basketball by aiming at a bicycle wheel nailed to a shed. It was an improvised beginning for an extraordinary life, and it set the tone for everything that followed: find a way, with whatever you have. At Rock Island High School, Nelson compiled a 47-7 record over his final two seasons and caught the eye of the University of Iowa, where he became a three-time All-American and Most Valuable Player. He averaged 21.1 points and 10.9 rebounds over three varsity seasons and left with 1,522 career points — a program record at the time. His father had hoped he would become a watch repairman; the NBA had other plans. Drafted in the third round by the Chicago Zephyrs in 1962, Nelson was cut and rebuilt, eventually finding a home with the Boston Celtics, where he spent eleven seasons and won five NBA championships. Red Auerbach, who called him a future great coach from early on, recognized in Nelson what the scorebook could not easily capture: a relentless competitor who made everyone around him better. Nelson set a Celtics "Iron Man" record of 465 consecutive games played and wore jersey number 19, which Boston retired in 1978. His defining moment as a player came in Game 7 of the 1969 NBA Finals, when his bouncing foul-line jumper with 1:17 left sealed a 108-106 victory over the Los Angeles Lakers. In 1976, Nelson transitioned to coaching with the Milwaukee Bucks, launching a 31-season career that would change the NBA itself. He pioneered "Nellie Ball" — a fast-paced, positionless style that put smaller, more athletic players on the floor and invented the "point forward" concept decades before the modern game caught up. Over 1,335 regular-season wins, he coached the Bucks, Golden State Warriors, New York Knicks, and Dallas Mavericks, winning the NBA Coach of the Year award three times (1983, 1985, 1992). In Dallas, he orchestrated the draft-night trades that brought Dirk Nowitzki and Steve Nash to the franchise, and in 2007 his eighth-seeded "We Believe" Warriors toppled the top-seeded Mavericks in one of the greatest upsets in playoff history. His final act in coaching included drafting and mentoring a young Stephen Curry. Inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2012 — the same year he returned to the University of Iowa to finally complete his bachelor's degree after 50 years away — Nelson received the Chuck Daly Lifetime Achievement Award in 2025. He lived for many years on a 22-acre farm in Maui, Hawaii, growing coffee under his own "Nellie's Coffee" brand, playing poker, and enjoying the life he had earned. Don Nelson passed away peacefully on August 9, 2026, at an assisted living facility in Frisco, Texas, surrounded by his family. He is survived by his wife Joy, six children, and fifteen grandchildren. He spent 50 years in the NBA doing something he loved — and he never let anyone forget how grateful he was for every single one of them.