Pep Guardiola and Joe Mazzulla may work in different sports, but the Boston Celtics coach used the career of Manchester City Boss as a “roadmap”.
Mazzulla led the Celtics to their 18th NBA championship last year, with Boston for the first time since 2008.
In the meantime, Guardiola has enjoyed enormous success in which he succeeded and has led Manchester City to six Premier League titles in the past seven seasons.
Mazzulla met Guardiola several times in 2024, including after game 1 of the NBA Finals.
And he explained how he considered Guardiola's career as a way to follow.
“Evidently, [I’m] Nowhere in the vicinity of the manager is Pep, but we share a similar start, “said Mazzulla in an interview with men in blazers.
“He coached the Barcelona B team, I was in the G League team of Maine, and they could easily have gone for a larger name, but they go to this guy who is in the back seat without experience.
“It became a route map for how I wanted to build a culture, a team, and you know, taking over the quantity.
“You look at his tactical ability, his ability to manage the best players, which I think separates coaches in every sport – that's something I thought I could really learn.”
Work hard pic.twitter.com/qk72oqyxg7
– Manchester City (@Mancity) 12 February 2025
Guardiola has won 652 of his 907 club matches in his spells with Barcelona, Bayern Munich and City, giving him a profit rate of 71.89%.
Asked what he discussed with Guardiola, Mazzulla explained: “The biggest thing I wanted to take from him was: How is it before you win?
“What are the challenges associated with winning the first? And how do you find that you have won?
“He has seen all those steps, and it just gives you a great perspective about: okay, if you are going to do this for a long time, here is what you can expect, here is how you can adapt and here is how you can look at it .
“I just thought it was someone who could really help me and so I appreciate his humility and it has been a nice journey, to build a kind of relationship with him.”
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