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Ever since the beginning of the NBA, coaches have played an integral role in each championship-winning team. Often an overlooked art, coaching has proven to be the skill that elevates a good team to legendary status.
In this article, we take a look at the 10 NBA coaches with the best win percentages in league history.
Top 10 NBA head coaches with the best win percentages
We have seen NBA coaches turn a good team into a great team by making the right adjustments and bringing a system that works. The Michael Jordan-led Chicago Bulls could not get past the 'Bad Boy' Detroit Pistons in the late 1980s until Phil Jackson came in and changed its attacking system.
The same happened with the Kobe Bryant-Shaquille O'Neal LA Lakers until Jackson arrived. We saw something similar with the Golden State Warriors, which exploded once Steve Kerr arrived, inserted Draymond Green in the starting lineup and established a new offense.
Without further ado, let us take a look at the 10 NBA head coaches with the best win percentage in the regular season.
Note: Only coaches with 100 or more games have been considered.
#10 Ed Macauley
137 NBA games | 89-48 W-L record | .650 win percentage
Ed Macauley coached the St. Louis Hawks between 1958 and 1960 in 137 NBA games. He is a Hall of Fame player, who was still playing few games during his first year coaching.
Macauley replaced Andy Phillip after the team started the 1958-59 season with a 6-4 record. He coached them to a 43-19 record in the remaining games and earned an NBA Playoffs spot, but his team lost in the Western Division Finals to the Minneapolis Lakers in six games.
Behind Bob Pettit, the team again had a great season in the 1959-60 NBA season with Macauley as the head coach. They ran away with the Western Division's top seed in the regular season with a record of 46-29. Back then, the NBA had eight teams, divided into the Eastern and Western Divisions.
In the West NBA Playoffs, the Hawks beat the Lakers in seven games in the Western Finals to reach the NBA Finals, but Bill Russell and the Boston Celtics overcame them in seven games.
#9 Red Auerbach
1417 NBA games | 938-479 W-L record | .662 win percentage
The legendary Red Auerbach was not only a great NBA coach, but he was part of seven NBA championships as an executive for the Boston Celtics after winning nine NBA titles as a coach.
Auerbach was coaching since the 1946-47 BAA season, which was the first in history. At the time, Auerbach was coaching the Washington Capitols, and achieved a 115-53 regular-season record with the franchise in three years.
After a single-season with the Tri-Cities BlackHawks (and having his only losing season), Auerbach coached the Boston Celtics for 1192 games in 16 years. He had a 795-397 record in the regular season, winning nine NBA titles and making 10 NBA Finals appearances.
The NBA Coach of the Year Award winner of each year receives a Red Auerbach trophy.
#8 K.C. Jones
774 NBA games | 522-252 W-L record | .674 win percentage
K.C. Jones coached 774 NBA games in 10 seasons, and he had an extraordinary winning percentage after coaching the Capital/Washington Bullets, the Boston Celtics, and the Seattle Supersonics.
Jones' .674 win percentage is eighth in NBA history among all coaches. In the 10 NBA seasons he coached, Jones' teams did not have a single losing season.
In the NBA Playoffs, Jones coached 138 games and had an 81-57 record. he won two NBA championships (with Boston) and recorded five NBA Finals appearances (four with Boston and one with the Bullets).
#7 David Blatt
123 NBA games | 83-40 W-L record | .675 win percentage
After a great coaching career in European basketball, David Blatt was an NBA head coach for two years during LeBron James' second stint with the Cleveland Cavaliers.
In the 2014-15 season, Blatt guided Cleveland to a 53-29 record in the regular season, and the team reached the NBA Finals. Though they fell to the Golden State Warriors in six games in The Finals, the team suffered injuries and missed two of their top 3 players in that series.
The following season, Blatt was fired after starting the year with a 30-11 record. The Cavs explained the decision by alluding to "a lack of fit" with the team's personnel and "vision".
Still, his win percentage is seventh in history among NBA head coaches.
#6 Gregg Popovich
1891 NBA games | 1277-614 W-L record | .675 win percentage
Gregg Popovich has a case to be considered the greatest NBA head coach ever, and his coaching career is certainly a successful one.
Pop has guided the San Antonio Spurs to six NBA Finals appearances and five championships, and the team went on a 22-year stretch with winning seasons.
His 1277 regular-season wins rank third among NBA head coaches in history, while he is third among NBA Playoffs wins too. Popovich is the only coach to be in the top 3 in regular season and playoff wins.
#5 Larry Bird
214 NBA games | 147-67 W-L record | .687 win percentage
Larry Bird is probably the most successful individual both at playing and coaching in the NBA.
Already a legendary NBA player, Larry Bird coached the Indiana Pacers during three seasons, from the 1997-98 campaign until the 1999-00 season. In those three years, the Reggie Miller-led Pacers reached the Eastern Conference Finals and played the 2000 NBA Finals against the Shaq-Kobe LA Lakers.
Bird coached 214 games and won 147, achieving the fifth-best win percentage by an NBA head coach in history (.687).
#4 Billy Cunningham
650 NBA games | 454-196 W-L record | .698 win percentage
Billy Cunningham coached the Philadelphia 76ers for eight NBA seasons from 1977 to 1985.
Cunningham led the team to a 454-196 record over those eight years in the regular season. Also, with Julius Erving on the team, they played three NBA Finals - all against the Showtime LA Lakers - and finally beat them in 1983 when Moses Malone joined the team.
Cunningham coached the team in 105 NBA Playoff games and had a 66-39 record, giving him a .629 win percentage in the postseason. This percentage is the ninth-best in history.
#3 Phil Jackson
1640 NBA games | 1155-485 W-L record | .704 win percentage
The Lord of the NBA Rings, Phil Jackson won a record 11 NBA championships with the Chicago Bulls (six) and the Los Angeles Lakers (five) as a coach.
Jackson started his head coaching career with the Michael Jordan-led Chicago Bulls in 1989. In his second season with the team, he guided them to the franchise's first NBA title and the first of their two three-peats.
Jackson won another three-peat with the Bulls from 1996 to 1998 before taking a sabbatical in the 1998-99 NBA season. He returned to coach the LA Lakers and won another three straight championships from 2000 to 2002. In his first 12 seasons as a head coach, Jackson won nine NBA championships.
He then won two more with Lakers in 2009 and 2010, before retiring in 2011 with 1155 regular-season wins and a record 229 in the NBA Playoffs.
#2 Steve Kerr
475 NBA games | 337-138 W-L record | .709 win percentage
Steve Kerr's head coaching career started with a great impact on the Golden State Warriors in 2014. In his first season, Kerr won the NBA championship with the team after a solid 67-15 regular season.
The team broke the all-time regular-season record with a 73-9 record the following season, though they lost the NBA Finals against the LeBron James-led Cleveland Cavaliers.
In his six-year 475-game coaching career, Kerr has 337 victories (.709 win percentage) and has reached five NBA Finals with the Warriors. In the NBA Playoffs, Kerr is the all-time leader in win percentage (.733) among NBA head coaches.
#1 Nick Nurse
154 NBA games | 111-43 W-L record | .721 win percentage
The reigning NBA Coach of the Year Award winner, Nick Nurse has completed two full seasons with the Toronto Raptors and has done an amazing job.
Nurse has coached 154 regular-season games and won 111 of those. His .721 win percentage is the highest in NBA history. Also, he has two NBA Playoffs appearances and one NBA championship with the Raptors in his first year as a coach (ninth in history to do so).
