The lengthy search process has come to an end.
Bryson Graham and the Chicago Bulls have hired Tiago Splitter as their new head coach.
A native of Brazil, Splitter spent seven years playing in the NBA, primarily with the Spurs, winning a championship in 2014.
Since his playing career, he began coaching, first with the Nets from 2020-2023, before spending a year with the Rockets, and then moving to Portland for the 2025-26 season. After Chauncey Billups’ gambling scandal, Splitter stepped into the head chair one game into the season, and helped the Blazers (42-40) to their first winning record and Playoff appearance since 2020-21. Their performance winning in the Play-In Tournament is why the Bulls own the 15th pick in the draft.
Splitter oversaw the development of Deni Avdija into an All-Star player, giving credence to his ability to develop young talent — perhaps the most important element of the job as the Bulls undergo their rebuild.
With new ownership taking over in Portland, and rumors of them wanting to go excessively cheap for their next coaching hire, Splitter was able to interview with and eventually accepted the position in Chicago.
Splitter becomes the 25th coach in franchise history, and will attempt to be just the eighth with a winning record.
After firing Arturas Karnisovas and Marc Eversley, Bulls president Michael Reinsdorf made it clear that he wanted Billy Donovan to return. But shortly after the end of the season, Donovan (226-256 in six seasons in Chicago) stepped down to give the Bulls a blank canvas as they embarked on overhauling the front office for a fresh start with new leadership.
In Graham’s introductory presser, Reinsdorf stated that the coaching hire responsibility would fall on the new EVP. At that time, Graham didn’t yet have a coaching shortlist, but did lay out a few of the characteristics he was going to be seeking.
“We’re looking for someone that’s smart,” Graham said in May. “We’re looking for someone that can lead, and someone who has really, really high character. And when I say smart, they’re good on both sides of the ball. I think a lot of times now you have coaches that lean towards offense and they lean towards defense, and that’s fine. But we’re going to try to find a coach that can coach both sides of the ball and care about both sides of the ball, and then develop these guys as they’re obviously young in their careers.”
His overall philosophy is to trust his ability to get the people right, whether or not that goes over well with the public.
“At every point in the position, let’s find the most competent, most talented people, and that can be a coach that you may not even heard of, and I might get killed for it, but if I believe in him, I’m gonna hire him.”
During the hiring process, the Bulls cast a wide net, reportedly interviewing a long list that included Minnesota’s Micah Nori, Miami’s Chris Quinn, Cleveland’s Johnnie Bryant, Oklahoma City’s Dave Bliss and former New Orleans interim coach James Borrego, among others. According to ESPN, the candidate list was in the double-digits.
There were six head coaching vacancies opened this summer, with Taylor Jenkins replacing Doc Rivers in Milwaukee, first-time head coach Sean Sweeney replacing Jamal Mosley in Orlando, and Mosley quickly finding a new home in New Orleans. Donovan is still without a job for the 2026-27 season.
That left the Bulls in competition with the Dallas Mavericks and Portland Trail Blazers for their next coach. The finalists were widely reported to be Splitter, Nori, Atlanta Hawks assistant head coach Ryan Schmidt and the in-house candidate and Donovan’s associate head coach, Wes Unseld Jr.
Nori was also a finalist for both Dallas, according to NBA insider Marc Stein, while both Nori and Splitter were finalists in Portland.
With only nine players from last season still under contract and two additional draft picks, big changes are expected to come to the roster. They’ll need the right person at the helm to lead and develop this new group, and Graham is now betting Splitter can be that person.
