Herb Williams

For other people named Herbert Williams, see Herbert Williams (disambiguation).

Herb Williams

New York Liberty
Position	Assistant coach
League	WNBA
Personal information
Born	(1958-02-16) February 16, 1958 Columbus, Ohio
Nationality	American
Listed height	6 ft 10 in (2.08 m)
Listed weight	242 lb (110 kg)
Career information
High school	Marion-Franklin (Columbus, Ohio)
College	Ohio State (1977–1981)
NBA draft	1981 / Round: 1 / Pick: 14th overall
Selected by the Indiana Pacers
Playing career	1981–1999
Position	Center / Power forward
Number	32
Career history
As player:
1981–1989	Indiana Pacers
1989–1992	Dallas Mavericks
1992–1996	New York Knicks
1996	Toronto Raptors
1996–1999	New York Knicks
As coach:
2003–2005	New York Knicks (assistant)
2004, 2005	New York Knicks (interim)
2006–2014	New York Knicks (assistant)
2015–present	New York Liberty (assistant)
Career highlights and awards
Third-team All-American – AP (1980)
Career NBA statistics
Points	11,944 (10.8 ppg)
Rebounds	6,509 (5.9 rpg)
Blocks	1,605 (1.5 bpg)
Stats at Basketball-Reference.com

Herbert L. Williams (born February 16, 1958) is a retired American basketball player in the National Basketball Association (NBA) for eighteen seasons from 1981 to 1999. Williams served as the interim head coach and the assistant coach of the NBA's New York Knicks. He is currently an assistant coach for the New York Liberty of the WNBA.

College career

Williams was a four-year starter for the Ohio State Buckeyes, scoring 2,011 points (then a team record) and pulling down 1,111 rebounds (still second in team history only to Jerry Lucas). Williams is the school leader in career field goals made, with 834 in 114 games. He is second all-time in career blocked shots with 328.

Williams was named to the All-Big Ten team as a junior, when Ohio State finished the year with a 21-8 record and advanced to the NCAA regionals. He led the Buckeyes in scoring that year with an average of 17.6 points per game.

Williams was a team co-captain in both his junior and senior years.

Professional career

Williams was a first-round draft choice of the Indiana Pacers in 1981, where he played from 1982 to 1989 and had his most productive years.

He was traded to the Dallas Mavericks midway through the 1988–1989 season on February 22 in exchange for forward Detlef Schrempf.

In 1992, he was signed by the New York Knicks, where he spent seven years backing up perennial All-Star Patrick Ewing. Williams played one game (31 minutes) for the Toronto Raptors in 1996 before being waived and quickly returned to the Knicks. The team made the 1994 and 1999 NBA Finals, with Williams serving as a team leader.

After the 1999 Finals, Williams retired at the age of forty-one after six regular season games and eight playoff games in 1999. Four years later, he returned to the Knicks as an assistant coach. He worked under head coaches Don Chaney and Lenny Wilkens. When Wilkens resigned in 2005, Williams took over as head coach.

On July 26, 2005, Larry Brown was hired as the head coach of the Knicks, thus ending Williams' head coaching tenure. Williams was the acting head coach of the Knicks for the final two games of the 2005–2006 season, when illness kept Larry Brown away from the bench for the final two games of his Knicks career.

After that season, Brown was fired by the Knicks and replaced as head coach by Isiah Thomas. Williams worked as an assistant coach under Thomas and Mike D'Antoni, and continued to be in the coaching staff under Mike Woodson until Phil Jackson fired the entire staff in 2014. He has coached for the Knicks' NBA Summer League team.

On March 26, 2015, Williams was hired as the assistant coach of the WNBA's New York Liberty.

Head coaching record

Legend
Regular season	G	Games coached	W	Games won	L	Games lost	W–L %	Win-loss %
Post season	PG	Playoff games	PW	Playoff wins	PL	Playoff losses	PW–L %	Playoff win-loss %

Team	Year	G	W	L	W–L%	Finish	PG	PW	PL	PW–L%	Result
New York	2003–04	1	1	0	1.000	(interim)	—	—	—	—	—
New York	2004–05	43	16	27	.372	5th in Atlantic	—	—	—	—	Missed Playoffs
Career		44	17	27	.386		—	—	—	—

See also

• List of National Basketball Association career blocks leaders
• List of NCAA Division I men's basketball players with 2000 points and 1000 rebounds

External links

• BasketballReference.com: Herb Williams (as coach)
• BasketballReference.com: Herb Williams (as player)
• NBA.com coach file: Herb Williams
• NBA player biography of Herb Williams at the Wayback Machine (archived February 11, 2001)

New York Liberty roster
Players	Coaches
Pos. # Nat. Name Height Weight DOB From Yrs G 22 Alston, Ameryst 5' 9" (1.75m) 178 lb (81kg) 07-15-1993 Ohio State R G 15 Boyd, Brittany 5' 9" (1.75m) 156 lb (71kg) 06-11-1993 California 1 F 2 Bulgak, Adut 6' 4" (1.93m) 156 lb (71kg) 12-20-1992 Florida State R F/C 31 Charles, Tina 6' 4" (1.93m) 186 lb (84kg) 12-05-1988 Connecticut 6 G 12 Harding, Lindsey 5' 8" (1.73m) 139 lb (63kg) 06-12-1984 Duke 8 G 10 Prince, Epiphanny  5' 9" (1.75m) 179 lb (81kg) 01-11-1988 Rutgers 6 G 14 Rodgers, Sugar 5' 9" (1.75m) 166 lb (75kg) 12-08-1989 Georgetown 3 G 5 Schimmel, Shoni 5' 9" (1.75m) 161 lb (73kg) 05-04-1992 Louisville 2 C 41 Stokes, Kiah 6' 3" (1.91m) 191 lb (87kg) 03-30-1993 Connecticut 1 C 8 Swords, Carolyn 6' 6" (1.98m) 209 lb (95kg) 07-19-1989 Boston College 4 G 30 Wright, Tanisha 5' 11" (1.8m) 165 lb (75kg) 11-29-1983 Penn State 11 C 17 Zahui B., Amanda 6' 5" (1.96m) 250 lb (113kg) 09-08-1993 Minnesota 1 G 1 Zellous, Shavonte 5' 10" (1.78m) 188 lb (85kg) 08-28-1986 Pittsburgh 7 East: ATL • CHI • CON • IND • NY • WAS | West: DAL • LA • MIN • PHO • SA • SEA	Head coach Bill Laimbeer (Notre Dame) Assistant coaches Katie Smith (Ohio State) Herb Williams (Ohio State) Athletic trainer Rosemary Ragle (Troy) Strength and conditioning coach Kevin Duffy (Ohio) Legend (C) Team captain (DP) Unsigned draft pick (FA) Free agent (S) Suspended Injured WNBA roster page