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Memphis Grizzlies General Manager Chris Wallace yesterday announced that the organization has hired Keith Smart and Adam Mazarei as assistant coaches on head coach David Fizdale’s staff.
Smart comes to Memphis with over 25 years of professional basketball experience as either a player or coach, spending the last two seasons (2014-16) working with Fizdale as an assistant coach for the Miami Heat, assisting in game management. Smart has served as head coach for three different NBA franchises, guiding the Sacramento Kings, Golden State Warriors and Cleveland Cavaliers, and has worked as an assistant coach for those same organizations. Before starting his NBA coaching career with Cleveland, he spent three seasons as head coach of the Continental Basketball Association’s (CBA) Fort Wayne Fury, guiding the team to the first back-to-back winning seasons (1997-99) in franchise history.
A graduate of Indiana University, Smart helped lead the Hoosiers to the 1987 NCAA National Championship and was named Most Outstanding Player of the NCAA Final Four after hitting the game-winning shot with five seconds remaining in the title game against Syracuse. Selected in the second round (41st overall) of the 1988 NBA Draft by the Golden State Warriors, Smart spent part of his nine-year professional career with the San Antonio Spurs (1988) before playing in the Philippines (1989), World Basketball League (1989-91), CBA (1992, 1995-97), Venezuela (1993) and France (1994).
Mazarei joins Fizdale’s staff after serving as a player development assistant for the Grizzlies for the past three seasons, during which time he assisted with advance and pro personnel scouting. Last summer, he attended the prestigious Grgurich camp, led by respected veteran NBA assistant coach Tim Grgurich, in Las Vegas. Before coming to Memphis, he served as an assistant and associate head coach for three years (2010-13) at Moorpark College in California where his responsibilities included assisting and organizing all scouting, recruiting, practice and game plans as well as player development.
In addition, Mazarei served as a player development coach at the IMPACT Basketball Academy in Las Vegas (2009-13) where he helped train current NBA veterans such as Serge Ibaka, Kyle Lowry and Terrence Ross in addition to pre-draft rookies. He holds a master’s degree in athletic administration and coaching from Concordia University, as well as a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of Redlands, where he led the SCIAC Conference in assists per game and paced the NCAA in assist-to-turnover ratio (5:1) as a senior.
