Jordan Turns to Old Friend to Lead Struggling Wizards

Doug Collins is reuniting with Michael Jordan, this time as the Washington Wizards’ coach.

The team announced Thursday that Collins will replace Leonard Hamilton, who resigned late Wednesday after the Wizards completed a season in which they won 19 games and lost 63--third-worst record in the NBA.

Michael Jordan, the Wizards’ president who was coached by Collins in his early days with the Chicago Bulls, hailed Collins as capable of “putting together a better basketball team here in Washington.”

Collins said he was excited about the opportunity.

“Michael Jordan called me on the phone and said, ‘I need you. Can you come here and help me?’ ” Collins said. “It was easy, once he said that. Whatever Michael needs from me, that’s what I intend to bring.”

Jordan said, “We’re introducing a coach that I had an opportunity to play for and against.”

“I think his record speaks for itself. He has an appetite for the game. He has an enthusiasm about the game,” Jordan said of Collins. “I think his knowledge of the game is going to be very helpful.”

Jordan declined to discuss terms of the contract.

Collins, an NBA game analyst for NBC Sports since 1998, was Jordan’s coach with the Bulls for three years before being fired after the 1988-89 season. He was replaced by Phil Jackson, who was Chicago’s coach as Jordan led the team to six NBA championships in eight years.

Collins also coached the Detroit Pistons from the start of the 1995-96 season through 45 games of the 1997-98 season.

Jordan also continued to quote the same long odds that he won’t return to the NBA as a player, but he quickly added that “three months from now, I can’t tell where I’m going to be.”

Jordan said he told Collins that he should not make his decision on whether to coach the Wizards “depending upon whether Michael Jordan plays basketball again.”

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Randy Wittman was fired as coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Wittman, whose teams lost 102 games the last two seasons, and this year won only 30--one less than the Clippers, the NBA’s measuring stick for ineptitude--was dismissed with one-year remaining on his three-year contract.

Cavalier General Manager Jim Paxson announced Wittman’s firing hours after Cleveland lost its 52nd game, dropping the home finale Wednesday in overtime to Indiana to finish with its worst record since 1985-86.

“As much as I am concerned about the number of games we lost, I was more concerned about how we lost them,” said Paxson, who hired Wittman in 1999. “Randy was the right guy for the team at that time. I feel Randy’s a good coach, he’s just not the right head coach for this team right now.”

Paxson said he hoped to hire a new coach before the June 27 NBA draft but would not discuss specific candidates. He expects to hire someone with NBA head coaching experience.

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The Detroit Pistons fired coach George Irvine, hours after the team ended the season 18 games under .500.

“This was a very difficult decision for me to make,” team President Joe Dumars said. “I want to thank George and his staff for their hard work and dedication, however at this time, I have decided to make a change.

Irvine said Wednesday he believed he’d be back next season, and he insisted that he would not resign--even if asked to.

“I’m a little surprised, and I’m certainly disappointed,” he said Thursday. “I thought the guys had worked hard and gotten better toward the end of the season.”

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General Manager Chris Wallace, picked for the job by former coach Rick Pitino, is being retained by the Boston Celtics, according to a newspaper report.

The Boston Herald, citing league sources it did not identify, reported Thursday that Wallace also would receive a promotion because the team has decided not to hire a director of basketball operations to serve above him.

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Patrick Ewing isn’t sure he wants to stay in Seattle after all.

“I want to win,” the SuperSonic veteran center said after his team ended a tumultuous season Wednesday night with a 105-67 victory over the San Antonio Spurs.

The SuperSonics finished 44-38, missing the playoffs for the second consecutive season. Seattle had a string of eight consecutive playoff appearances before last year.

“I don’t know what I want,” Ewing, 38, said. “I know I want to play. I enjoyed being here. But this is my first time in a long time that I haven’t been in the playoffs. That definitely hurts.”

Ewing, acquired from the Knicks in a four-team trade on Sept. 20, 2000, has said he would like to play two more seasons.