Chuck Daly, the coach of the 1992 Olympic Dream Team, has passed away from Pancreatic cancer.  He was 78.

The Hall of Fame coach led a Detroit Pistons team to NBA championships in 1988-89 and 1989-90.  Those teams featured Isiah Thomas, Joe Dumars, Bill Laimbeer, and Dennis Rodman.  After leading the Bad Boys to the repeat, Daly was tasked with bringing home the gold medal in the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona.  That 1992 Olympic basketball team is commonly known as the Dream Team.

From the AP: Daly joined the NBA coaching ranks in 1978 as an assistant under Billy Cunningham in Philadelphia. His first head coaching job was with Cleveland, but he was fired after the Cavaliers went 9-32 the first half of the 1981-82 season.

In 1983, Daly took over a Detroit team that had never had two straight winning seasons and led the Pistons to nine straight. He persuaded Rodman, Thomas, Dumars, Mahorn and Laimbeer to play as a unit and they responded with championships in 1989 and 1990.

Being from Michigan, I am more than familiar with this man.  Chuck Daly was a true class act on and off the court – John Salley gave him the nickname “Daddy Rich” because Daly always wore impeccably-tailored suits, and he was a hell of a coach.  An intelligent, patient and understanding coach that knew how to blend personalities together and bring success; Chuck Daly will trule be missed.

The Detroit News has a special section dedicated to Chuck Daly with news and photos from their archives.  If you have the time, take a look at Daly’s hugely successful tenure in Detroit.

We’ll leave you with Chuck Daly’s words at his news conference when he left the Detroit Pistons,

“It’s been a blast,” Daly said. “It’s been a hell of a run.”

Links and Resources: Special Report: Chuck Daly Remembered (The Detroit News), NBA, Olympic coach Chuck Daly dies at 78 (Yahoo via AP), Stylish to the end: Here’s a toast to the best professional basketball coach in city’s history (The Detroit News), The 1992 Dream Team DVDs (Interbasket)