{"id":143859,"date":"2025-06-08T06:30:54","date_gmt":"2025-06-08T10:30:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=143859"},"modified":"2025-06-08T05:29:46","modified_gmt":"2025-06-08T09:29:46","slug":"tiago-splitter-to-join-trail-blazers-coaching-staff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/06\/08\/tiago-splitter-to-join-trail-blazers-coaching-staff\/","title":{"rendered":"Former NBA Champion To Join Trail Blazers Coaching Staff"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Entering the 2024-25 NBA season, many believed <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/03\/24\/chauncey-billups-sees-blazers-potential\/\" target=\"_self\">Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups<\/a> was a lame duck coach. While he had a team option for 2025-26, the lack of progress Portland had shown made it seem as if Billups would not be retained. Having a preseason <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/leagues\/NBA_2025_preseason_odds.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">O\/U win total of 21.5<\/a>, Portland widely exceeded that number as they finished 36-46. The Trail Blazers gave Billups an extension, keeping him behind the bench. It seems as if an NBA title-winning player will be joining him as an assistant coach. <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/s\/splitti01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Tiago Splitter<\/a> will also be joining the Trail Blazers coaching staff for the 2025-26 season.<\/p>\n<h2>Former NBA Champion To Join Trail Blazers Coaching Staff<\/h2>\n<h3>Tiago Splitter Will Become An Assistant Coach For The Trail Blazers<\/h3>\n<p>Splitter has been an assistant in the NBA before, but he was out of the league last season. Apparently he is back in, as according to Chema de Lucas, an international writer, Splitter will be joining Portland. They will be the third NBA team he has been an assistant coach with after the Brooklyn Nets and Houston Rockets.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"es\" dir=\"ltr\">\u00daLTIMA HORA: El entrenador de la gran sensaci\u00f3n de Euroliga, Paris, Tiago Splitter, vuelve a la <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/NBA?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#NBA<\/a> para unirse al staff t\u00e9cnico de los Blazers de Chauncey Billups.<\/p>\n<p>Paris Basketball coach, Tiago Splitter, is returning to the <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/NBA?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#NBA<\/a> to join Billups&#39; coaching staff at Portland.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Chema de Lucas (@chemadelucas) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/chemadelucas\/status\/1931471809318466025?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">June 7, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_143887\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-143887\" style=\"width: 640px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-143887\" src=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2025\/06\/USATSI_15789176_168414264_lowres-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2025\/06\/USATSI_15789176_168414264_lowres-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2025\/06\/USATSI_15789176_168414264_lowres-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2025\/06\/USATSI_15789176_168414264_lowres-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2025\/06\/USATSI_15789176_168414264_lowres-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2025\/06\/USATSI_15789176_168414264_lowres-600x400.jpg 600w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2025\/06\/USATSI_15789176_168414264_lowres-1200x800.jpg 1200w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2025\/06\/USATSI_15789176_168414264_lowres.jpg 1923w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-143887\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Mar 24, 2021; Salt Lake City, Utah, USA; Brooklyn Nets assistant coach Tiago Splitter and Utah Jazz guard Joe Ingles (2) bump fists before the game at Vivint Smart Home Arena. Mandatory Credit: Chris Nicoll-USA TODAY Sports<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Last season, Splitter got his first taste at being a head coach. He became the head man for Paris Basketball, in their first year leveling up to the EuroLeague from the EuroCup. They won the EuroCup in 2024, thus being allowed to make the jump. Splitter took over for Tuomas Iiasalo, who joined the Memphis Grizzlies as an assistant (and is now their head coach). Splitter helped guide Paris Basketball to the EuroLeague quarterfinals where they fell to Fenerbahce.<\/p>\n<p>Billups will have more than just Splitter as a new face on his coaching staff. It was also <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.hoopsrumors.com\/2025\/06\/trail-blazers-adding-splitter-st-andrews-to-coaching-staff.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">reported on Saturday<\/a> that Patrick St. Andrews was coming aboard. Quinton Crawford, who was the head coach for the reigning G League champion Stockton Kings, <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.hoopsrumors.com\/2025\/05\/quinton-crawford-joining-trail-blazers-coaching-staff.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">previously was said<\/a> to also be coming to Portland.<\/p>\n<h3>NBA Playing Career Lasted Seven Seasons<\/h3>\n<p>Standing at 6-foot-11, Splitter played seven seasons in the NBA. He was the 28th overall selection in the 2007 NBA Draft but remained overseas before making his NBA debut in 2010. He spent five seasons with the San Antonio Spurs, one with the Atlanta Hawks, and his final one with the Philadelphia 76ers.<\/p>\n<p>In 2014, Splitter was a member of the Spurs championship-winning team. He started 18 of his 23 appearances during that postseason and scored 12 points in Game 1 of the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/06\/06\/thunder-vs-pacers-takeaways-nba-finals-game-1\/\" target=\"_self\">NBA Finals<\/a>. San Antonio defeated the Miami Heat in five games during that year\u2019s finals.<\/p>\n<p>Altogether, Splitter appeared in 355 regular season and 65 postseason outings in the NBA. He made 153 starts in the regular season and finished with averages of 7.9 points, 5.0 rebounds, and 1.2 assists. The center shot 55.5% from the field and 69.7% from the foul line. Splitter\u2019s most productive season came in 2012-13 when he had career-best averages in scoring (10.3), rebounding (6.4), and assists (1.6). His career-high of 26 points took place on April 25, 2012 in a Spurs win over the Phoenix Suns.<\/p>\n<p>Photo credit: \u00a9 Jaime Valdez-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Entering the 2024-25 NBA season, many believed Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups was a lame duck coach. While he had a team option for 2025-26, the lack of progress Portland had shown made it seem as if Billups would not be retained. Having a preseason O\/U win total of 21.5, Portland widely exceeded [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5060,"featured_media":143885,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,62,3,23],"tags":[115,443],"class_list":["post-143859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-nba","category-news","category-trailblazers","tag-chauncey-billups","tag-tiago-splitter"],"modified_by":"Kenny Kluska","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143859","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5060"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=143859"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143859\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":143890,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143859\/revisions\/143890"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/143885"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=143859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=143859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=143859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}