Another year, another new team to coach for Larry Brown.

On Tuesday, Brown was introduced as the Charlotte Bobcats’ new head coach, the ninth NBA team he will lead. The Hall of Famer will look to improve on his last go-around in the league, a horrendous 23-59 season with the New York Knicks two years ago. Thankfully, this time should be different.

Michael Jordan, the Bobcats’ Managing Member of Basketball Operations and a part-owner of the team, was the man that hired Brown. When Jordan was in the Washington Wizards’ front office, he tried to hire Brown to the same position but failed to do so. After a year as an executive vice president in the Philadelphia 76ers’ organization, Brown accepted Jordan’s second offer to coach his team.

The significance of Jordan is twofold. First, pairing Jordan, the greatest player in the history of the league, with Brown, one of only five NBA coaches with 1,000 career wins, is just plain scary. They share an incredible desire to teach and win, which bodes well for the inexperienced Bobcats. Second, they are both alumni of the University of North Carolina.

While Brown and Jordan attended UNC 20 years apart, they were both coached by the legendary Dean Smith, who–aside from his coaching accomplishments–was known for having a tight-knit fraternity of players. Many of Smith’s former players who stayed in basketball accomplished great things on and off the court, and obviously Jordan and Brown are not exceptions.

If Brown is to get back to his winning ways, however, he will need the young Bobcats to buy into his hardnosed style of coaching. His experience in New York was painful to watch, but judging by his career resume, one has to think the rest of the Knicks organization had more to do with it than Brown.

Charlotte seems like a good fit for Brown. The team’s roster is full of potential, headlined by Gerald Wallace and Jason Richardson. There are a couple of question marks as to whether the team can re-sign free agents Emeka Okafor and Raymond Felton, but if they do, the Bobcats will have plenty of clay for Brown to mold.

Again, the key for Charlotte is whether these young kids will buy into Brown’s system. But considering Brown’s success in the league, it seems unlikely they won’t. Charlotte was 32-50 this season, but in the dismal Eastern Conference, that’s only five wins away from the eighth seed. Under Brown’s tutelage, the Bobcats will play their first postseason game in franchise history next season, and Jordan will taste his first success in the front office.

Andrew Bohardt is a junior journalism student at Ohio University. He can be contacted at ab320905 [at]ohio.edu.