The Dallas Mavericks are finalizing a deal to hire national championship-winning Michigan coach Dusty May to fill their head coaching vacancy, ESPN and The Athletic reported Monday.
May, 49, guided the Wolverines to a 37-3 record and an NCAA Tournament title in his second season in Ann Arbor in 2025-26.
He replaces Jason Kidd, who mutually parted ways with the Mavericks on May 19 after five seasons on the bench. Dallas finished 26-56 last season, its worst record since the 2017-18 season.
May, who has never worked in the NBA, inherits a Mavericks roster featuring reigning NBA Rookie of the Year Cooper Flagg.
May leaves behind a 2026 recruiting class ranked No. 2 in the nation by 247Sports, headlined by five-star point guard Brandon McCoy Jr. and four four-star prospects: forwards Quinn Costello, Malachi Brown and Lincoln Cosby and guard Joseph Hartman. The Wolverines also added three top transfers: center Moustapha Thiam (Cincinnati), forward Jalen Reed (LSU) and forward J.P. Estrella (Tennessee).
A deal to make Michigan assistant coach Mike Boynton Jr. the interim head coach is in the works, according to ESPN. Boynton, previously the head coach at Oklahoma State from 2017-24, would look to bring stability before a 15-day transfer portal window opens for Michigan’s roster five days after the next coach’s hire is announced.
According to ESPN, May is the first college head coach to take an NBA job since ex-Michigan coach John Beilein took over the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2019. The last coach to jump to the NBA immediately after winning the NCAA title was Larry Brown of Kansas, who became head coach of the San Antonio Spurs in 1988.
The first order of business for May is the NBA draft that begins on Tuesday. The Mavericks have the Nos. 9 and 30 picks in the first round.
May turned around the Wolverines in short order, posting a 64-13 during his two seasons after Michigan was 8-24 the year before he arrived. He agreed to a contract extension soon after Michigan’s 69-63 victory over UConn in the title game on April 6.
He previously took Florida Atlantic on a shocking run to the Final Four in 2023 and compiled a 126-69 record there in six seasons (2018-24) before replacing Juwan Howard at Michigan. His overall record is 190-82.
Kidd’s tenure with the Mavericks was hot and cold. He twice led his squad to 50 wins or more, including a Western Conference championship in 2023-24. That team ultimately lost to the Boston Celtics in five games in the NBA Finals. Yet he also had three losing seasons.
Kidd, 53, finished 205-205 over five seasons in Dallas with a 22-18 playoff record and is 388-395 (31-33 playoffs) as a head coach overall.
–Field Level Media
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