MILWAUKEE — Del Harris wasn’t sure about this coaching thing.

He wanted to be a minister, or so he thought. But Harris started out coaching the seventh- and eighth-grade boys and girls at King Springs Elementary School in Johnson City, Tenn., in 1959.
That’s where he caught the coaching bug, and he caught it good.
“We scored over 100 points four times, playing 6-minute quarters,” Harris recalled. “I said, ’Maybe this is a better plan for me.’ After 50 years, it probably was the right thing.”
Harris, former head coach of the Milwaukee Bucks, Houston Rockets and Los Angeles Lakers, officially announced his retirement Tuesday to complete 50 years of coaching at all levels, including the National Basketball Association and international ranks. It wasn’t an easy call for the 71-year-old native of Plainfield, Ind., who spent last season as an assistant to Vinny Del Negro with the Chicago Bulls.
“I had thought initially I would do it for a couple (more) years,” Harris said. “We just finished with such a great flurry the last two months and the playoffs. And it made the 50th year.”
The Bulls shook off a rocky start to grab an Eastern Conference playoff berth, and they extended the defending champion Boston Celtics to seven games in a thrilling first-round series that featured four overtime games.
But now Harris can kick back at his Dallas home and reflect on a career that included everyone from Moses Malone to Sidney Moncrief to Nick Van Exel to Mark Cuban to Derrick Rose.
Harris was the Lakers’ coach when a skinny 18-year-old named Kobe Bryant arrived on the scene in 1996.
Harris reached the NBA Finals once as a head coach, in 1981 when his Houston Rockets lost to the Celtics in six games. And he was there once as an assistant, with the Dallas Mavericks when they fell to the Miami Heat in 2006.
He was named NBA coach of the year in 1995 with the Lakers.
But some of his best memories came in Milwaukee, where he succeeded Don Nelson as head coach in 1987. The Bucks made the playoffs in each of Harris’ four seasons, before he was removed as coach early in the 1991-’92 season.
“They said our team was too old, but we still made the playoffs every time,” Harris said. “They were the smartest teams; those guys knew how to play.
“Of all the teams I’ve had, the Bucks teams were the easiest to coach. They really played old-school ball.”
Among the stars on those Bucks teams were Moncrief, Terry Cummings, Paul Pressey, Ricky Pierce, Jay Humphries, Larry Krystkowiak and Jack Sikma.
“Sikma came in, and he was great,” Harris said, “one of the best teammates in the history of the league. Sidney was a great teammate.
“We had the fourth-best record in the league in the ’80s, behind the Lakers, Celtics and 76ers. I’ve been in the league all this time, and I don’t think there were any teams since then that were better than those two teams,” he said, referring to the Lakers and Celtics of that era.
Harris actually started his association with the Bucks in 1983, when Nelson hired him as a scout. Harris declined an offer to be a full-time assistant because two of his children were in school in Texas, and in part because he thought he would quickly get another coaching job after being fired by the Rockets following the 1982-’83 season.
“It never happened; the phone never rang,” Harris said. “We did this for three years, and by the third year I had just about given up on the NBA.
“The Texas economy hit the bottom at that time. I was invested in gas, oil and Texas real estate, and all that went down to nothing. I said, ’Nellie, if you still want me to come up, I’m coming up.’ “
Harris took that assistant’s role under Nelson in 1986-’87, when the Bucks won 50 games after acquiring Sikma in a pre-season trade with Seattle.
The Bucks met Julius Erving and the Philadelphia 76ers in a first-round series, and Harris had to take over as coach in the decisive fifth game when Nelson was ejected by referee Earl Strom.
“We ended up winning the game and the series,” Harris said. “It was the last game Dr. J played in the NBA.”
Harris showed a passion for the game from the outset, whether he was coaching high school teams in Indiana, at Earlham College or during summers in Puerto Rico. And he had a keen knowledge of tactics and defensive and offensive schemes.
He started his NBA career as an assistant with Houston in 1976, and when his friend and Rockets coach Tom Nissalke moved on to Utah in 1979, Harris took over as Rockets coach.
“He’s got great patience, and he’s a tremendous teacher,” said Harris’ son, Larry, the former Bucks general manager and now an assistant coach with the Golden State Warriors. “He has coached old guys, young guys, middle-aged guys.
“The amount of people he’s touched, it’s overwhelming. And he remembers everyone.”