Dunleavy Is Mild About Milestone

Mike Dunleavy was so eagerly awaiting coaching his 1,000th NBA game Friday he had to be told by the Clipper media staff that he had reached the milestone.

“It’s good to be around that long, and I hope I’m around another 1,000 games,” Dunleavy said. “But I didn’t know it was coming until yesterday.”

He began his career with the Lakers in the 1990-91 season, a team he took to the NBA Finals (losing to Chicago in five games).

He said he could still remember his first game. And he handled it in his typical fashion

“It was a loss in San Antonio. I went home, was bummed out, and went out to dinner,” said Dunleavy, who has also coached with Portland and Milwaukee.

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Dunleavy almost didn’t go into coaching. When he retired as a player in 1985, he went to work for Merrill Lynch in New York, and said he was successful. But he would still watch games, and Don Nelson, then coach of the Bucks, kept pestering Dunleavy to join his staff.

What changed his mind? Dunleavy thought he had proved to himself that he could make it on Wall Street. But he was working so much he felt he never saw his family, except on weekends.

“I missed spending time with my [three] kids,” he said.

So when Nelson asked him again to be an assistant before the start of the 1986-87 season, Dunleavy was ready to say yes.

“I told my wife I’d like to try this,” Dunleavy said.

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Fans see a placid expression on Dunleavy’s face most of the time. But Clipper assistant Jim Eyen, who has been on Dunleavy’s staff since the latter began with the Lakers, said the head coach is one competitive guy.

“In 1990, during our first training camp in Hawaii,” Eyen said, “the staff was sitting down at dinner. We got into this conversation about some obscure tax law. I interpreted it one way, he another. So we bet $20.

“The next morning, he hands me some papers with the tax law written out and highlighted to prove his point and win the bet. This was the days before e-mail and everything. He had a friend fax over the material. He probably spent $50 to take my $20. And took it he did.”