Stone sees the potential in Udoka to shock this locker room and instill some order in this team, both within the players as of the their appealing market. Back in the 2021/23 campaign, Udoka guided Boston to a 51-31 record, becoming one of the five rookie coaches to ever reach the NBA Finals in the past 25 years.

His mark on the Celtics franchise doesn’t stop there, as he also led the team to become the NBA’s No.1 in defensive efficiency last year and a top 10 in offense. As for Houston, they finished in the bottom five of both categories this campaign.

Both Frank Vogel and James Borrego were part of the coaching search

According to sources, two former NBA coaches were also prominent members of the Rockets’ coaching search comittee, as ex-Lakers trainer Frank Vogel and former Charlotte coach James Borrego led the study.

The Celtics team were also probed by the Houston administration before making the offer, as they saw fit for him to finally return to coaching.

“An independent law firm probe into Udoka found that he used crude language in his dialogue with a female subordinate before the start of an improper workplace relationship with a subordinate, an element that significantly factored into the severity of Udoka’s initial suspension,” sources told ESPN back in September.

These findings were considered especially concerning coming from a workplace superior, and eventually contributed for Udoka not to be reinstalled as the Boston boss.