Rick Mahorn Q&A

Whatever it is, Mahorn appears to be all business now in his third year as an assistant coach for the Shock. Nothing illustrated this better when he passed on an off-handed question about whether or not the Pistons, for whom he's a radio analyst, need to start rebuilding. "I only care about the Shock now," he said. WNBA.com's Mark Bodenrader chatted with Mahorn to dig a little deeper into his role with the Shock and his coaching career.

Q: How did you come to be an assistant coach with the Shock?
MAHORN: “Bill Laimbeer begged me and begged me. No, he just always asked me if I wanted to get back into coaching since it wasn’t a great experience in Atlanta (as an assistant with the Hawks). And finally I broke in and said, yes, I’ll try it.”

Q: What is your relationship like with Bill, as a coach?
MAHORN: “We have admirable respect for each other. We respect each other’s opinion. Either one of us, if it was something said that was dumb or dorky, we would comment on it, but we would keep on going because the ultimate goal is to win a championship. That’s what it's like working with a friend and a guy that you respect as a coach, and he respects you as the same thing. It’s a great relationship.”

Q: What is your relationship like with the players?
MAHORN: “We all get along well. We have a great dynamic on our basketball club. Different people can talk to certain players and get their point across. Cheryl Reeve helps us out a lot from the woman’s standpoint. Bill had this team and some of the core players. So it’s a great relationship with the players where you can speak your mind and they understand.”

Q: What group of players do you work with?
MAHORN: “I am responsible for the post players and I’m responsible for the defense, and Cheryl is responsible for the defense of the guards as well. Bill is offense.”

Q: What are your goals as a coach? Do you want to be a head coach some day? Do you want to go back and coach in the NBA?
MAHORN: “My ultimate goal is just to coach, be it NBA, be it WNBA. It’s just the fact that I’m enjoying doing what I do, teaching and making sure players get to that next level. We as coaches, we want to make sure we get them to the next level, to respect us and to win championships.”

Q: What advice would you give coaches teaching younger players earlier in the basketball development stages?
MAHORN: “Discipline. Make sure the players learn their fundamentals and know what the game is all about. Put them in situations that put them on the same page to make them work as a unit.”

Bill Laimbeer on Mahorn...
"It is great having a coach that you can really trust, and that knows you. I also give him his space. He is a personality unto himself also. So I give him complete charge of the defense – him and Cheryl Reeve. They do all the work on the defense and they are the ones that are on the floor teaching the players and working with them individually defensively. But on top of that, his relationship with the players. He is one of those people that crosses all lines of gender, of race, of personality. He gets along well with them, everybody that he meets, and the players love him. It is a great thing for me because the head coach always has to act a little bit standoffish because they do make the decisions and they are the ones that the players like to bitch at. So you have an assistant like that that can be the buffer between the players and the head coach. That is a tremendous asset."

Katie Smith on Mahorn...
“He’s just a good guy to talk to. He definitely doesn’t get as fired up as Bill in a sense. You can kind of talk with Rick throughout a game, even if we’re not doing so well. He just shoots it to you straight. But he’s somebody you can talk to and say, ‘Hey, what do I need?' and he kind of knows how to say it. He’ll get on you when he needs to, but he’ll also say it in a nice way if need be. His tact is a little bit better than others.”