MILWAUKEE – Monty Williams was standing on the sideline as coach of the Phoenix Suns when they were eliminated in Game 6 of the 2021 NBA Finals by the Milwaukee Bucks. The scenario was vastly different on Saturday against the Bucks as his Detroit Pistons lost their 23rd consecutive game to drop to an NBA-worst 2-24.
Despite being in the midst of the “toughest challenge of his coaching career,” Williams, the 2022 NBA Coach of the Year with the Suns, certainly has it in perspective as he has been through much tougher challenges personally.
“Life can be funny,” Williams told Andscape following the 146-114 blowout loss to the Bucks. “Just three years ago, I’m standing on the sideline coaching in the Finals. And basketball life can change up on you. Both times that I coached here with the Pistons this season I’ve thought about it. So, I’m sitting on the sideline, and I don’t feel bad about it. It’s just the way it is. I’ve always had this perspective about what other people go through.
“I did a mission trip in South Africa a long time ago. I was at a church and we were going through praise and worship. At the end of my trip, I was going back to my nice home in San Antonio. This lady beside me was going back to her hut with a dirt floor, tin roof and cardboard. And I always think about that. I couldn’t tell you what she looked like. I just know that she was praising God right next to me … You can kind of look at it in your own lens and think you’re going through a lot of tough stuff. And I’m sitting there thinking this lady has way more faith than I do. I’m going back to my gated community, my NBA job and money in the bank and all this stuff I had. She’s going back to a squat camp.”
Williams had a 194-115 regular season record and 27-19 mark in the playoffs with the Suns from 2019 to 2023. Under the former NBA player’s watch, the Suns won a franchise-record 64 games during the 2021-22 season and reached the NBA Finals in 2021. The Suns fired Williams with three years and more than $20 million left on his contract on May 13 after a second-straight disappointing playoff exit.
Williams is familiar with personal loss. On Feb. 10, 2016, his first wife, Ingrid, died from injuries sustained after a driver lost control, crossed lanes and struck after her car head-on in Oklahoma City. They had five children together. After Williams’ current wife, Lisa, and another family member went into remission from cancer, he planned on taking time off to regroup.
On June 1, however, Williams agreed to return to coaching sooner than anticipated after the Pistons offered him a coaching deal worth a record $78.5 million over six years, making him the highest-paid coach in NBA history. With a young, injury-plagued roster, however, the Pistons have dropped a franchise-record 23 games in a row. The longest losing streak in NBA history is 26 games by the 2010-11 Cleveland Cavaliers, who finished that season 19-63.
Pistons guard Cade Cunningham says Williams has been straightforward as coach so far and also is staying positive about all the losses. Detroit next plays on the road against the Atlanta Hawks Monday night.
“He has been great,” Cunningham told Andscape. “I enjoy learning from him, just the way he lives and his language. He is always spot-on. He has good timing with what he says. We have the system. We have to make the plays. It’s on us, the players. We have to find ways to expand it a little more with our talent. We’re trying to figure ourselves out through the system with growth.
“He is definitely positive, but also he is realistic. He will tell you the truth more than anything. We’ve been bad. He always calls out what he sees, so we’re appreciate of that.”
The following is a Q&A with Williams in which he talks about the challenges of coaching the struggling Pistons and turning it around, his son Elijah, the third-ranked boys prep basketball player in ESPN’s Class of 2026, his Christian faith, and much more.
Stacy Revere/Getty Images
How are you taking the losing?
It bothers me because it’s my job to figure it out. I’ve lost my wife and I’ve had two close family members deal with cancer. So that’s a perspective that I always have. But this is my body of work and [to] come here to lose like this, I want to do better than we’ve done.
How and when did you put this into perspective?
It’s always been. Ever since I’ve lost Ingrid, I’ve always had that perspective that nothing’s going to be that bad. You lose somebody that you’re that close to, the rest of the stuff can’t compare. Now, that’s totally different. Sports can cross over sometimes if you’re not careful. And I can’t let it, because our guys, they come in every day wanting to grow, wanting to learn. I signed up for this. We didn’t think it’d be this hard, but this is what I signed up for.
Your wife had cancer and one of your other family members did three years ago. How has that taken a toll on you?
That’s why I had to wait as long as I did to take a job dealing with that. [Lisa is] good. She’s clean. No cancer, went through the whole deal. Double [masectomy]. She’s good. I got the real good news probably mid-July, late July. It was like getting the news with my other family. When you get the news, you’re like, ‘Thank you, Lord.’ Because that weighs on your mind when you’re trying to coach and run your team. And in the back of your mind, when one of your family members has something like cancer, there’s no words for it. You just go to the Lord in prayer, trust him that he knows what’s going on and ask him for the strength to get through.
You said you think about that woman from South Africa a lot who had little. Did she seem happy?
She was at peace. It was better than happiness. She was praising God for who he was, not for what she can get. And that’s different than what you see from a lot of religious folks nowadays.
How do you turn the Pistons fortunes for the better?
Sometimes it’s good to only have one choice. Your choice is to fight. I didn’t come into this thinking it was going to be easy. We didn’t think we’d have this many injuries to so many key guys. Like tonight, Stewie [Isaiah Stewart] couldn’t play. It’s one of those things that’s just happened all season long. JD [Jalen Duren] has been out most of the year. He is a huge part of what we do. Cade has been the most consistent guy. Bojan [Bogdanović] just started playing. And you are playing in a tough Eastern Conference. Our schedule has been crazy. We have been playing all the top teams so far. There’s really nothing you can do about it. You just got to keep going.
How do you keep your players positive?
Everything you want is on the other side of hard. There ain’t no secret sauce to this … That’s why I don’t get into all that other external stuff. The noise outside. Cats know me. The next day I pray and ask God for direction, and you keep it moving. Yeah. We got to improve. And don’t get it twisted, man. This is hard. But what choice do you have?
As a Christian, is there a Bible verse you’re leaning on?
Proverbs 3:5-6. Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways, acknowledge him and he will make your path straight.
It’s not always going to be smooth. But we can trust the Lord and lean that onto what we’re thinking. Just trust him. And he says, make your path straight.
How do you and your family enjoy Christmas from a religious and presents standpoint?
We do give gifts. We celebrate the gift of Jesus Christ. And when we give gifts, we think about that. So, yeah, we celebrate Christmas like everybody else does.
I’m sure the assumption is no matter what you’re great because of your paycheck. What would you say to that?
It’s going to sound like a cliché, but yeah, the money is great. It would be stupid for me to sit here and say it wasn’t a big deal when somebody’s that generous with you. But my want and desire is to see a team like this blossom into something really, really cool, which was really important to me. There were other opportunities that were already set up and those doors weren’t open for me because of my wife’s situation. And that was done by design, by God, so that I couldn’t walk into those situations when I could do it. When I could do it, this was the only door open.
And I don’t take that lightly, the fact that God opened the door at the right time. So, the money may have been there with other teams. But at the same time, this opportunity was the only one open when I could coach.
Gregory Shamus/Getty Images
The Pistons aren’t playing on Christmas. What does it mean to spend Christmas with your family?
It’s a bonus for me. If you think about the two family members that I had that had cancer, when we’re all together, that’s something that runs through my mind. The other part that runs through my mind is my [first] wife is gone. And so, from that perspective, there’s a lot that goes on in my mind when I’m there. I have all of my kids, I have a new wife, a new son. But then there’s a part of me that thinks about what it used to be like, too. I’m grateful for my wife Lisa, because she allows me to do both. She doesn’t start tripping. She’s not jealous or any of that stuff. She knows she can’t understand what we’ve been through as a family. So, Christmas, for me, I think about what it used to be like and now I think about what it is and I’m grateful for all of it.
How do you reflect on Phoenix now?
I got fired. Well, every time I change a guy’s rotation or I sit a guy, that’s basically what I’m doing. I’m firing him. How can I be upset when it happens to me? That’s my perspective. Everybody else may have their own based on how it was done or when it was done. I can’t get caught up in this stuff. I got too much to be thankful for in my life to let that take away from how blessed I am. [I’ve] been in the league 30-plus years.
How is Elijah progressing on and off the court as he continues to rise as a prep basketball star?
I’m just trying to keep him a kid. Focus on the work, be a good kid. He knows if he doesn’t keep his legs clean and do his chores, he won’t play ball. And he knows I’m dad first. I was called to be his dad, not his friend. That’s where it is with me. Do we talk about basketball? All the time. He’s in the gym with us. He works out with the coaches. He’s just a good kid.
There are a lot of things coming at him right now and some of it he has to deal with on his own. Some of it I can help him with. Some of it the staff and players help him with because they see him in the gym, they talk to him. I’m focused on the basketball part for him because it’s important to him. But I’m really focused on him being a good kid.
What would you say to fans who love and bleed Pistons basketball, who are frustrated by the losing?
It’s tough to even put it into words. Even with this losing streak, I’m around town, taking my kids to games, I still get an unbelievably great deal of support. And it means the world to me. But we’re not done. I know it seems bad right now, and it is. This thing will turn and I just have to have faith and belief. This is the toughest challenge I’ve had in my coaching career. But I felt that way when I got to Phoenix and that thing turned. This one has taken a bit longer, but we’ve had way more obstacles.
I can’t thank them enough for the support that they’ve shown me, especially when I’m moving around town, because I’m not going to run from [the losing] especially when I’m dealing with my kids and going to church. That’s pretty much the gist of it for me. And everybody has been unbelievably supportive and I can’t say enough how grateful I am for them.
