While reading the NBA board talking about Vince Carter, it was mentioned Vince has made it further than Tracy in the playoffs. I went back and looked, and Vince's lone playoff advance came at the expense of Van Gundy's Knicks in Van Gundy's last full season as coach. The Knicks led the series 2-1 before Toronto won games 4 and 5 to take the series. This got me to looking a Van Gundy's playoff record- he's 38-36 overall, which is pretty solid, but looking a bit further. He's made it to the second round FIVE out of SEVEN times. His two failures were against the aforementioned Toronto team and against last year's Lakers. His 7 playoff trips have led to: -2 1st round first exits -3 Conference Semifinals berths -1 Conference Final berth -1 NBA Finals Appearance It should also be noted that this year's Rockets were the 2nd most successful regular season team Van Gundy has ever coached! His 2nd season produced a 57 win Knicks team that lost to Miami in 7 games in round 2. JVG's 1999 Knicks won 50 games, and they went to the Conference Finals. The NBA Finals team came in the lockout shortened season, but was only 27-23 in the regular season. Six for eight sounds good to me.
With a 96-68 record in his two seasons with the Rockets, Jeff Van Gundy's .585 winning percentage is the best of any coach in Rockets history.
Wow, really? Great! That's after last year's team underperformed by a lot, too. JVG is the man. I'm glad he's the guy leading the Rockets. His stats do look promising. I feel his focus on defense will allow the Rockets to overcome the Mavs, even though Dirk is gonna wreak terror in the first round.
Shìt bro, Dirk's gonna 'reek' of 'terror' with RyBow's hyperactive, ritalin-fueled ADD all up in his face. Hands-flying, feet-skittering, ass-twitching mayhem, baby. Dirk won't know whether to dribble or call for a straightjacket. WBSS!
no doubt... Get Bowen some coffee before the game. He'll be spazzing out so much on defense against Dirk that Dirk will start laughing and drop the ball...
Carter advanced in the 2000-01 post-season which was TMac's first season in ORL. In a curious twist of fates, JVG and TMac faced each other the year before (TMac's last in TOR) which the Knicks swept in 3 straight.
