The New Orleans Pelicans hiring team did its best Reggie Evans impersonation this week, scooping up Jamahl Mosley in a ferocious flash. The Orlando Magic fired him as their head coach on May 4, and the Pels signed him as their own two weeks later.
However, the summer’s head coaching candidate that Brooklyn Nets fans care most about remains available as does one of the team’s fan favorites are still out there — with at least one team still considering them.
This week on his substack, Marc Stein reported
that Jordi Fernandez’s No. 2 and longtime friend, Steve Hetzel, along with former Nets forward Jared Dudley remain head coaching targets for the Portland Trail Blazers. They also seem to have some new competition hailing from the Twin Cities.
“League sources tell The Stein Line that the Blazers, meanwhile, have expressed interest in Minnesota assistant coach Micah Nori in addition to previously reported candidates Jared Dudley and Hetzel,” Stein wrote.
In the same substack, Jake Fischer later confirmed that Hetzel got as close as you could to the NOLA job before it ultimately went to Mosley: the short list. The job is open because new owner, Tom Dundon, had made it clear that another coach with a Nets connection, Tiago Splitter, will not return as head coach. Splitter, who was a Nets assistant and player development coach for five years, was elevated to the top job in Portland the day after head coach Chauncey Billups was suspended indefinitely following his arrest on illegal gambling charges.
“(Splitter) remains a candidate for the full-time post on some level along with various assistant coaches we’ve reported on like Micah Nori (Timberwolves), Jared Dudley (Nuggets), Greg St. Jean (Lakers) and Brooklyn’s Steve Hetzel, who was a finalist for the New Orleans job,” Fischer wrote.
Hetzel had been an assistant coach in Portland between 2021 and 2024 before joining the Nets. He also has had assistant coaching gigs in Detroit, Charlotte and Orlando. He served as head coach of Cleveland’s G League team early in his career as well as Portland and Brooklyn’s Summer League teams in recent years. He ran the Nets’ team in Las Vegas the last two years.
In addition, Hetzel has been involved in the Nets draft process, having been frequently shown in last year’s SCOUT series that highlighted the 2025 draft process. With another big pick to make in about a month, then two summer leagues after that, we’ll know soon if he’ll be back again helping out here … or elsewhere.
