Mavericks reject Knicks’ Jason Kidd interview request

As expected, the Dallas Mavericks have denied the New York Knicks’ request to speak with Jason Kidd about becoming their next head coach, according to The Stein Line’s Marc Stein and ESPN’s Shams Charania. This comes on the heels of the Knicks getting rejected by the Houston Rockets and Minnesota Timberwolves to talk to Ime Udoka and Chris Finch, respectively.

New York is seeking a replacement for the recently fired Tom Thibodeau, who helped lead the franchise to its first Eastern Conference Finals appearance in 25 years. The Kidd rumblings began last week, but the belief all along was that the Mavericks wouldn’t grant the Knicks’ request.

Still, there were some rumblings that kept the door open for a move. ESPN’s Tim MacMahon wouldn’t totally dismiss the possibility out of hand, even though he said Kidd wasn’t necessarily looking for a way out of Dallas. MacMahon noted some issues Kidd has had with recent Mavericks decisions.

ESPN’s Brian Windhorst also claimed “mutual interest” between Kidd and the Knicks. This sentiment made sense given Kidd played for New York and coached Knicks star Jalen Brunson when he was in Dallas.

But now it looks like Kidd will indeed stay with the Mavericks, unless he makes a big stink and demands out. There’s little evidence that will happen, though, so the Knicks will have to move on.

What’s next for the Knicks? 

It’s interesting that the Knicks fired Thibodeau with an apparent initial plan to go after coaches entrenched in good jobs already. New York had to know there was little chance of hiring one of these guys away, but perhaps James Dolan, Leon Rose and Co. wanted to simply try the pie-in-the-sky route first before moving on to other candidates.

It doesn’t seem like college legends such as Jay Wright, Rick Pitino and Dan Hurley are interested. Michael Malone and Taylor Jenkins were both fired at the tail end of this regular season and could be options, with Malone a popular name bandied about given his championship resume. Stephen A. Smith tried to start up the Mark Jackson hype train, but that’s almost certainly not going to happen.

Could Johnnie Bryant wind up being the guy? Firing Thibodeau to hire a first-time head coach for a title push would be bold, but Bryant was Thibodeau’s associate head coach from 2020-24 before joining Kenny Atkinson with the Cleveland Cavaliers this season. Bryant finished second to Jordan Ott for the Phoenix Suns’ head coaching job.

It’s hard to believe the Knicks don’t have a legitimate backup plan in mind, so we’ll see where they turn to next after this Jason Kidd rejection.