Who Are the Coaches for the NBA All-Star Game and How Are They Determined?

This year’s All-Star Game will feature three NBA coaches leading three teams.

Detroit Pistons coach J.B. Bickerstaff calls out in the first quarter against the Denver Nuggets. | Ron Chenoy-Imagn Images

NBA All-Star weekend is back for another year, with the biggest names in basketball ready to take part in another new format as the league continues to tinker with its grand midseason exhibition.

This year, the pool of All Stars has been divided into three squads—two made up of American players, and one made up of international players. The teams will play in a short round-robin tournament this Sunday, with the two teams emerging with the best record facing off in a winner-take-all final.

Normally, the roster construction of All-Star teams is pretty simple—East vs. West, USA vs. World, rookies vs. sophomores for the rising stars challenge.

But the round-robin format of this year’s competition changed that up a bit, and also added a slight tweak to how the coaches of the three respective rosters were determined.

Who are the coaches in this year’s NBA All-Star Game?

The coaches for the All-Star Game this weekend are as follows:

Team	Coach
Team Stars	J.B. Bickerstaff (Pistons)
Team Stripes	Mitch Johnson (Spurs)
Team World	Darko Rajaković (Raptors)

How are the coaches for the All-Star Game selected?

Under the East vs. West format, the selection of All-Star Game coaches was rather simple—take a coach from the best team in each conference, and go nuts.

This year brought a slight tweak to that format. The first two coaches were selected based on which team had the best record in each conference through Feb. 1.

In the East, that was J.B. Bickerstaff, who has the Pistons on an absolute tear to start the season. In the West, the team with the best record on Feb. 1 was the Thunder, but because Mark Daigneault had already coached at last year’s All-Star Game, the honor passed on to the next coach in line.

The league established what’s known as the “Riley Rule” in 1991, which ensures that a team in the midst of a dynasty doesn’t send its coach to the All-Star Game year after year after year.

With a win over the Magic on Feb. 1, the Spurs took hold of the second best record in the West, sending Mitch Johnson to his first All-Star Game.

In the spirit of the Team USA vs. Team World format of this year’s All-Star Game, the third coach comes as a representative of the NBA’s international cohort. NBA commissioner Adam Silver named Raptors coach Darko Rajaković as the person who will lead the international team into the tournament.

The festivities on Sunday tip off at 5 p.m. ET on NBC.

---