PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Paul Westhead was no stranger to winning big at basketball in Philadelphia.
He made a habit of it, going 67-17 with three NCAA Tournament appearances as a basketball player at Saint Joseph’s University. He later coached La Salle to a pair of top 10 rankings and NCAA Tournament berths.
But 1980 was very different.
That year, Westhead was winning at his city’s expense. That year, he was breaking his hometown’s heart.
On May 16, his Los Angeles Lakers defeated the Philadelphia 76ers 123-107 at the Spectrum in Game 6 of the 1980 NBA Finals, to clinch the first championship of five that they won that decade,
In doing so, Westhead pulled off a pretty remarkable feat - not only because he had been coaching in college less than a year earlier, but because he didn’t become the Lakers’ head coach until the 15th game of the 1979-80 season.
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Chester-born Jack McKinney, who was an assistant coach at Saint Joseph’s when Westhead played there, was hired to coach the Lakers in 1979 and made Westhead his assistant. A month into the season, McKinney suffered a biking accident while riding to meet Westhead for a game of tennis.
The injuries were so serious he couldn’t coach the Lakers the rest of the year, so Westhead was bumped up to the top job.
Westhead, who played high school ball at West Catholic and got his coaching start at Cheltenham High School, called the Lakers’ title run a life-changing moment.
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“I can just remember winning and flying back from Philadelphia,” said Westhead, who is now 83. “[For] the parade, they picked up my children in a limo, and my youngest daughter, she was hungry, so the driver stopped at McDonald’s and [the kids] are eating Big Macs and driving in a limo.
“Trust me, being from Philadelphia, that was the first limo they ever saw, let alone were in.”
Over the course of a coaching career that spanned 40 years, Westhead pretty much did it all. He won, he lost, he got hired and fired, then hired and fired some more. In total, he held seven head coaching jobs in college, the NBA and WNBA.
He coached men and women, both at the college and pro levels. He experienced unimaginable tragedy after the death of Hank Gathers in a game he was coaching for Loyola Marymount in 1990, and the thrill of winning it all again, with his second championship coming in the WNBA with the 2007 Phoenix Mercury.
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Every step of the way, Westhead says he took a little bit of Philadelphia with him.
“You’re always a part of where you come from and how you grew up,” he said.
In a recent interview on the KYW Newsradio In Depth podcast, Westhead reflected on a lifetime in hoops, and discusses the new HBO drama series Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty, in which Jason Segel plays Westhead.
Listen to Westhead's full interview with KYW Newsradio In Depth below.
Here are some excerpts from the chat.
Brian Seltzer: Have you seen Winning Time yet?
Paul Westhead: I have. I’ve seen the first two [episodes] in the series. I find it intriguing because many of the events [so far], I wasn’t there. I was still back in Philadelphia at La Salle, enjoying a cheesesteak.
BS: Based on what you’ve seen and the other characters, do you have any trepidation about how you’re going to be portrayed?
PW: I have mixed feelings. Why? Because they’re kind of killing almost everybody else. I don’t know how they’re going to portray me, but I know if the series goes long enough, it won’t turn out well for me, because eventually I get fired…I kind of get run out of town. But in year one, we did pretty well. We get to the Finals and we eventually are successful and win in Philadelphia against a great Sixers team - Dr. J (Julius Erving), Maurice Cheeks. We were very proud of that.
BS: What about Jerry Buss (the Lakers’ owner played by John C. Reilly)?
PW: The portrayal of him, I think - no, I know - is a little exaggerated. He was a happy guy and he liked to party and do things like that. But he’s never going to go to a local liquor store, buy a bottle of whiskey, and lay on the floor of the Forum saying, “I own this team!”
Another thing about Jerry Buss, he was a very smart guy, he was very clever. I mean, he might say, “Hey, you want to have a drink?” as he was negotiating a deal, but he was a numbers guy. There was no messing with that.
When Buss wanted something, money didn’t matter. He did not have any self-imposed salary cap. He wanted to win that much. In retrospect, if you can have an owner that will spend the money to get the players you want, you can’t do much better than that.
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BS: Later on, when you coached at Loyola Marymount, you implemented a run-and-gun, breakneck speed style of play. Two of your players, Hank Gathers and Bo Kimble, were from Philadelphia. For people unfamiliar with them, what effect did they have on your system?
PW: Hank and Bo were double tough. They were relentless. They were not to be messed with. They said, “If you want to play fast, we’re going to play fast and we’re going to bring everybody with us.” That’s exactly what it took for my running game to take off.
It was just off the charts the way the two of them, with my other guys, bought in and speed would wear you down. The speed was unstoppable.
BS: You coached the Phoenix Mercury to a WNBA title in 2007 [and also coached women’s basketball at the University of Oregon from 2009-14] . What were your takeaways from coaching both the men’s and women’s game?
PW: When I had the women in the WNBA, we had a losing season and everyday they worked at it, worked at it. They bought in and stayed that way. There is a difference. Guys will see that their individual game isn’t going well in your system, and they’ll abandon you. I’m not saying they’re wrong, but they will abandon you. They’ll say, “My career is at stake and you’re not helping me, buddy.” The women, they’re much more of a group psyche. The team counts more to them. So that is a difference.
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BS: Will James Harden put the Sixers over the top?
PW: I like James Harden. I never coached him, although in my last NBA job in Oklahoma City, we had Kevin Durant. But I followed Harden. There’s something about him that I really like. Usually, the stars who want the ball all the time, it’s their game, “I’m either going to win for you or lose for you and get out of my way.” They’re not really endearing kind of guys, but there’s something about Harden that’s endearing. I still don’t know how he pulls it off, how he just dribbles the ball and people get out of his way. He beats them.
I’m a James Harden fan. I hope he’s the perfect player to get this team together and get to the Finals like I [coached] against them in the 1980s. Once they get to the Finals, they’re on their own.
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