SAN ANTONIO — Spurs fans were confused Saturday night about who was in charge of the Spurs after Coach Gregg Popovich was ejected from the game against the Trail Blazers.
Early in the third quarter, Popovich was ejected after receiving a scond technical foul. Video from the bench showed assistant coach Tim Duncan leading the huddle at times.
Other times, assistant coach Becky Hammon was seen talking with the players.
The video also showed both of them in discussions, along with another assistant coach, Will Hardy.
Hammon was promoted to a front-of-bench assistant coach position in 2018. The departures of other assistant coaches before this season prompted some on social media to speculate that she would assume leadership in the event that Popovich was ejected.
In that scenario, Saturday would have been a historic occasion as the first time a woman led an NBA team in a regular season game.
However, when members of the media asked Popovich after the game to clarify who was in charge in his absence, he replied: "Timmy was."
When he was further asked if he had considered that Hammon leading the team would have made history, he replied: "I am not here to make history."