West Virginia beams as its adopted son stands on top of the NBA world

Coffee is simply an option for my mornings.
But not Tuesday morning.
It was a necessity.
See, I stayed up late Monday watching, admiring, former WVU player and Fairmont State head coach Joe Mazzulla become an NBA Championship coach with the Boston Celtics.
I was born and raised in Fairmont, where my favorite coach was ex-FSU coach Joe Retton. I attended and then covered WVU for most of my life.
And while we just finished eulogizing West Virginia’s favorite son Jerry West, we now celebrate one of our favorite adopted sons in Mazzulla.
Last night, of course, cemented Mazzulla’s place in Celtics’ lore. Including playoffs, Mazzulla’s record is now 148-54 — a .729 winning percentage. Among all coaches with at least 200 games in the NBA, no one has a better record than that.
And get this: He’s only the 37th coach in NBA history to win a title and the seventh to do so from the Celtics’ bench, joining Red Auerbach, Bill Russell, Tom Heinsohn, Bill Fitch, K.C. Jones and Doc Rivers. (Take a beat and consider that.)
As for his place in WVU lore, it was March 28, 2010, in Syracuse, N.Y., where he cemented his legacy. Playing at the Carrier Dome in the Elite Eight for the Mountaineers, Mazzulla scored a career-high 17 points in his first start of the season to help WVU handle a Kentucky team chock-full of future NBA players – John Wall, DeMarcus Cousins, Patrick Patterson, etc. — 73-66.
I was courtside. And that was as stunning as Mazzulla’s rise through the NBA coaching ranks.
It was the first time the Mountaineers had gone to the Final Four since, yes, Jerry West was the star of the team 51 years prior. Playing with a surgically repaired shoulder, Mazzulla was inserted because Truck Bryant broke his foot.
Kentucky had lottery picks. West Virginia had Mazzulla. We saw that spark, that fight that night, just as Celtics big man Kristaps Porzingas saw all season in Boston.
“Joe is an animal,” said Porzingas.
Any even casual follower of the NBA knows Mazzulla has had his critics. But as one who covered him and got to know him, I bristled. “Get to know him,” I kept thinking, “just a little and you might not be so loud.”
I came to that conclusion at an off-beat place: Bobby’s bar in Cross Lanes, W.Va. I used to do a fun live off-the-record show with, mostly, sports figures. Joe brought his wife Camai and the crowd enjoyed our back-and-forth.
What struck me that evening though was Mazzulla’s amazing recall, his intelligence and sharp wit. I remember specifically his ability to run through the Final Four game play by play, what defense they were in, what play or option was called, which player took what shot. You could almost see the sparks flying in his mind.
Celtics owner Stephen Pagliuca obviously saw it too when he hired Mazzulla. These were his first words after being handed the Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy Monday night:
“The brilliance of Joe Mazzulla is he wouldn’t let expectations get in the way,” Pagliuca said on ABC. “Joe Mazzulla said there’s no expectations. You’ve got to win or die trying. Joe set a plan and kept everybody focused and these guys played team basketball — great Celtics basketball. It wasn’t about expectations; it was about getting it done.”
And, boy, did he get it done, guiding Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown and company over the Dallas Mavericks 106-88 to finish off a five-game roll through the finals and secure the team’s record 18th championship.
“There’s nothing better than representing the Celtics,” Mazzulla, a Rhode Island native said, “and being part of history.”
He’s the youngest to win an NBA title since Bill Russell at the same age in 1969.
The flashes of Mazzulla etched in my mind keep stacking up. The Final Four. His appearances (he also came to Charleston with John Flowers) at my shows. The picture of him with the O’Brien trophy in a Boston social media graphic with the text “2023-24 NBA Champions, Joe Mazzulla” — as, that is, he wears the T-shirt “But First… Let Me Thank God.”
The best snapshot from Monday, however, may have been the bear hug from Tatum after the final buzzer sounded. It wasn’t a hug. It was a full-blown bear hug. His players, you could see, love the guy.
“He’s really himself. He’s like authentic to himself. We all appreciate that,” Celtics guard Payton Pritchard said. “He’s not trying to be somebody he’s not… He’s different, but we respect that. Then the basketball genius, you can learn a lot from him as to how he sees the offensive side of things, the play calling, the game management, all that. He’s elite in that. I’ve personally learned a lot from him, and I think our whole group has.”
He’s a heck of a story, from Glenville as an assistant to Fairmont as a head coach to the Celtics’ G League team as a coach to being a part of Brad Stevens’ staff with the Celtics to becoming head coach.
He’s lived the life – and some not so flattering. ESPN commentator Kendrick Perkins, a former Celtics player, once called him a “birdbrain” and that if you take his brain and put it in a bird it would fly backwards. (Perkins later admitted he was hurt because he wasn’t part of an email from Mazzulla to former team players. He held a grudge.)
But those that know Joe, know he’s that dawg, that animal, as Porzingas said. Criticism? Mazzulla not only takes it, but embraces it.
“I feel like it’s going to be that way my whole career – as it should be,” he said in the postgame interview. “Praise and criticism are equally as dangerous… You need that. You need criticism. You need praise. And there’s no place I’d rather be.”
Despite nursing a torn meniscus he suffered in March, his place right now is on top of the NBA world.
And West Virginia University fans couldn’t be prouder today of their adopted son.
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Mitch Vingle covered sports in West Virginia for 38 years. Follow Mitch on Twitter at @MitchVingle and be sure to check out the rest of Wheelhouse Creative’s website for your marketing and advertising needs. If interested, call us at 304-905-6005.