Appreciation: Gregg Popovich had a view of the world, and it changed both the Spurs and the NBA

Gregg Popovich understood the world.

That goes back long before the basketball world knew who he was. It probably can be traced to at least Popovich's time at the U.S. Air Force Academy, where he majored in Soviet studies and was on his way to becoming a spy.

He became an icon instead.

Popovich's time as coach of the San Antonio Spurs ended Friday, six months after a stroke essentially ended his tenure — in that capacity, anyway — without him knowing it. He stepped down, Mitch Johnson was promoted from acting coach to head coach, and just like that, the Spurs started a new chapter.

Popovich isn't going anywhere. He's still the team president. He'll be around. He'll have influence. His role going forward is probably largely up to him, a right that he's earned over the last 30 or so years. His view of the world shaped many of the things that the Spurs are today. Same goes for the rest of the league as well, and as proof, look at any roster these days.

Some of the best players in the game — Nikola Jokic, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Luka Doncic, Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Spurs' own franchise player in Victor Wembanyama among them — were born outside the United States. Would they have been in the league without Popovich? Almost certainly, yes. But did Popovich and the Spurs help create the path that saw more international players get into the league? Most definitely.

“They were a pioneer around the international game,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said of the Spurs — specifically Popovich and his longtime right-hand man, team CEO R.C. Buford — earlier this year. “They were scouting internationally in a deep way long before many other teams.”

Basketball is played all over the world, and Popovich — forever the student — wanted to learn about all of it. He was finding players in Europe in the late 1980s, long before it became common. As the stories go, Popovich still can't walk around places like Belgrade without being recognized. That's probably not much of an exaggeration, either.

Just look at the roster of all-time Spurs greats: France’s Tony Parker and Argentina’s Manu Ginobili formed one of the league’s all-time Big Threes with Tim Duncan — another player whose view of the world was perhaps a bit different, having grown up in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Boris Diaw, Tiago Splitter, Marco Belinelli, Beno Udrih, Jakob Poeltl, Fabricio Oberto, Pau Gasol and many more were part of the Spurs program as well. Popovich had international coaches — Italy's Ettore Messina made big headlines in Europe when he joined the Spurs, for example. And Popovich picked the brains of others when he was coaching the U.S. national team, including former French national team coach (and Wembanyama's coach) Vincent Collet, someone he went head-to-head with for Olympic gold at the Tokyo Games in 2021.

“There are smart people everywhere,” Popovich once said, around the time he was taking over as the U.S. coach. “None of us has it all figured out. Everybody brings something to the table that you might not have thought about.”

If anyone came close to having it all figured out, it was Popovich.

He's a Basketball Hall of Famer. The NBA's all-time win leader. A five-time champion with the Spurs. Coached the U.S. to Olympic gold. And that's just the stuff everybody knows about. Ask the people who operate the San Antonio Food Bank what Popovich has quietly done for them and the answers will take a while. Same goes for the Innocence Project and St. Jude's Children's Hospital, two other causes he supports.

Popovich was more than a coach. He was a guy from Indiana who could shoot the ball well and was smart, parlayed that into an Air Force education, should have made the 1972 U.S. Olympic team as a player, took some of the disappointment from that and began learning how to coach instead, took over a Division III team in California that had lost 88 consecutive conference games and turned it into a champion, kept climbing the ladder and here we are.

The Air Force Academy — a place he would return to many times after his graduation — taught him countless lessons, including to embrace different views and to never stop evolving.

“What you learn there is to get over yourself,” Popovich said. “It’s not about you.”

He never stopped learning, either. He changed the Spurs. Changed the NBA, too. Forget the championships and records and one-liners and everything else. Popovich helped change the NBA.

That's his legacy.

FILE - In this Feb. 28, 2015, file photo, San Antonio Spurs forward Tim Duncan, left, and head coach Gregg Popovich chat on the bench during the first quarter of an NBA basketball game against the Phoenix Suns in Phoenix. (AP Photo/Rick Scuteri, File)

FILE - San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich directs his team during in the fourth quarter of an NBA basketball game against the New Orleans Hornets in San Antonio, Wednesday, April 15, 2009. (AP Photo/Eric Gay, File)

FILE - In this June 14, 2014, file photo, San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich smiles as a question is asked during a news conference for the NBA basketball finals in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez, File)

FILE - United States players put a gold medal on head coach Gregg Popovich during the men's basketball medal ceremony at the 2020 Summer Olympics, Saturday, Aug. 7, 2021, in Tokyo, Japan. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall, File)

FILE - San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich smiles during the NBA basketball team's media day, Monday, Sept. 27, 2021, in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Eric Gay, File)

ROME (AP) — Late goals from Pierre Kalulu and Kenan Yildiz earned Juventus a 2-0 win at promoted Pisa on Saturday as the Bianconeri won their third straight in Serie A.

It was a challenge for Luciano Spalletti’s side, though, as Pisa threatened by twice hitting the woodwork.

Following morale-boosting victories over Bologna and Roma, Juventus moved up to third place – four places higher than when Spalletti was hired to replace the fired Igor Tudor two months ago.

Edon Zeghrova provided a burst of energy for Juventus when he came on just after the hour mark and his work down the left flank led to Kalulu finishing off a counterattack from close range.

Yildiz then added another from close range in stoppage time.

Pisa’s 17-year-old winger Louis Thomas Buffon, the son of former Juventus captain Gianluigi Buffon, came on in the 85th for his fourth Serie A appearance.

Earlier, Como won 3-0 at Lecce to move up to sixth as Nico Paz netted his sixth of the season. Jacobo Ramon and Anastasios Douvikas added goals for the visitors.

Fiorentina’s crisis deepened with a 1-0 loss at Parma that left the Viola in last place. Oliver Sorensen scored shortly after the break for Parma, which moved five points clear of the drop zone.

Also, Udinese and Lazio drew 1-1; and Cagliari came back from a goal down to win 2-1 at Torino.

AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

Juventus' Weston Mckennie, right, and Pisa's Idrissa Toure in action during the Serie A soccer match between Pisa and Juventus in Pisa, Italy, Saturday Dec. 27, 2025. (Marco Bucco/LaPresse via AP)

Juventus' Lloyd Kelly and Pisa's Mehdi Leris, left, in action during the Serie A soccer match between Pisa and Juventus in Pisa, Italy, Saturday Dec. 27, 2025. (Marco Bucco/LaPresse via AP)

Juventus' Pierre Kalulu, center, scores a goal during the Serie A soccer match between Pisa and Juventus in Pisa, Italy, Saturday, Dec. 27, 2025. (Marco Bucco/LaPresse via AP)

Juventus' Pierre Kalulu celebrates after scoring a goal during the Serie A soccer match between Pisa and Juventus in Pisa, Italy, Saturday, Dec. 27, 2025. (Marco Bucco/LaPresse via AP)