With a gray Nets tracksuit on his back and even a salt-and-pepper beard, Will Weaver has been back on familiar ground since Tuesday. Between two instructions shouted to his players on shooting exercises, the Nets assistant coach took up his quarters at the Marcel-Cerdan sports center in Levallois, ahead of the match between Brooklyn and Cleveland on Thursday evening at the Accor Arena ( 20 hours). Seven months earlier, in the yellow and blue enclosure of the Metropolitans 92, Weaver appeared in front of the microphones to announce after a final defeat the end of his adventure with Paris Basketball, on the evening of the 34th and final day of the Championship .
“I was very flattered that Paris asked me to stay, to become the general manager in addition to my coaching duties, but I had the opportunity to return to the NBA. I was going to interview for the position of head coach in two franchises (including the Milwaukee Bucks),” recalls the native of Austin, Texas, who ultimately accepted Brooklyn’s offer to return to the position of busy assistant before crossing the Atlantic. “There was a little adjustment time to leave this head coach costume and become an assistant again,” smiles Weaver.
In the absence of a French or even European player in the Nets squad, he became a “tourist guide” for his franchise roaming the capital. “But I keep the best addresses for myself,” he immediately laughs. Weighed down by a series of five consecutive defeats when he could not sit on the bench as head coach, due to lack of diploma equivalence, the American coach’s only season in Paris ended without a play -offs. Far from the level displayed this season by the club chaired by David Kahn, runner-up to Monaco in the elite, under the distant eye of Weaver.
A victory and a defeat at Bercy before Thursday
“I exchanged messages with Gauthier Denis (the only one of his former players still in the squad) and I am happy to see the season they are having. It’s incredible to see this core imported from Bonn playing so well in France, with a lot of squad depth. I was also already a fan of Nadir Hifi last season. Paris has a chance of winning the title in the Eurocup as well as in the Championship,” even assures the former Parisian technician, who led a coaches conference at the start of the week at the Halle Carpentier, home for another month of Paris Basketball until at the inauguration of the Adidas Arena on February 11.
If the entire Nets will open their victory or defeat counter at the Accor Arena on Thursday, Weaver can return to the positive side. “We lost against Asvel at Bercy (69-86) before beating Limoges (88-81, first victory for Paris on the banks of the Seine). Thursday will be the best for me in this room,” concludes the former member of the staff of the Australian selection at the 2016 Olympic Games. Not yet updated, his X account still presents him as coach of Paris Basketball.
