Andrei Kirilenko was surrounded by greatness the moment he arrived in the NBA, as he got to be teammates with Karl Malone and John Stockton on the Utah Jazz. It was quite the privilege and on a recent appearance on the Knuckleheads podcast, Kirilenko was asked what it was like to be on the same team as Malone and Stockton.
“It was surreal,” Kirilenko said. “When you step on the court just at the practice and you see all those guys, it’s just like I had the feeling that something is wrong. It’s a different reality, I’m delusional right now, like something’s going on. But when you start playing basketball, it’s all the same. But first 10-15 minutes, you’re like something is wrong.”
That was a totally understandable reaction. Kirilenko had watched Malone and Stockton play in the NBA Finals in 1997 and 1998 against Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls and now he was their teammate. He would have felt he was out of place, but once the action commenced, he was locked in.
Kirilenko would go on to impress one and all as a rookie. He averaged 10.7 points, 4.9 rebounds, 1.1 assists, 1.4 steals, and 1.9 blocks per game in 2001-02 and finished third in voting for Rookie of the Year. The Jazz had to wait for two years for Kirilenko to arrive, as he had been drafted with the 24th pick in 1999, but he showed he was worth the wait.
In 2003, Stockton retired and Malone left for the Los Angeles Lakers, which meant Kirilenko suddenly became the leader of the team. He would step up to the challenge by averaging 16.5 points, 8.1 rebounds, 3.1 assists, 1.9 steals, and 2.8 blocks per game in 2003-04 and his efforts were rewarded with a spot on the All-Star team.
Kirilenko would remain a key piece for the Jazz in the following years and even finished third in voting for DPOY in 2006. He later had stints with the Minnesota Timberwolves and the Brooklyn Nets and ended up playing 13 seasons in the NBA. He finished his career with averages of 11.8 points, 5.5 rebounds, 2.7 assists, 1.4 steals, and 1.8 blocks per game.
Andrei Kirilenko Speaks On Playing Under Jerry Sloan
When Kirilenko joined the Jazz, he also got to play under the legendary Jerry Sloan, who had been the head coach of the franchise since 1988. Sloan had a reputation for being a hard taskmaster and Kirilenko was hilariously asked if he ever acted like he didn’t know English when he was being yelled at.
“Every day for the first three months, like, ‘Okay, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t want to hear it,'” Kirilenko said. “He was a hard, hard coach. Everything Jazz do at that point was a system. You have to be a part of the system.”
“We run those drills until you like fell down,” Kirilenko stated. “You know exactly what you’re supposed to do the certain point. When you played the game, I knew every minute when the substitution is coming and for me it was so crazy. I was like, ‘ Man, we’re playing different teams, different leaders, different scenario of the game. How come we have a substitution this particular same time. You have to change it.'”
It was Sloan’s way or the highway, though, so nothing was going to change. Kirilenko did recognize, though, that Sloan’s methods had their benefits and they had a fair bit of success together at the end of the day.
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