From Derby to Drake - Nick Nurse's journey to top of NBA

Toronto Raptors coach Nick Nurse is at the pinnacle of his sport having won the NBA title in his first season as a head coach in the league.

He has come a long way since starting out in coaching at the Derby Rams in the British Basketball League in the 1980s where life was distinctly low budget.

Nurse remembers standing by a roadside next to a broken down minibus somewhere in the British countryside wondering "where am I and how the heck did I get here?"

He was 22, straight out of college and working as a player-coach at the Rams.

"I wasn't old enough to drive the team van so my starting centre had to. I remember it breaking down out in the middle of the country one time. It was a low-budget situation, low-budget team," he says.

Flash forward about 30 years to June 2019 and Nurse has just led Toronto to their first NBA title having been cheered on all the way from the sidelines by his side's super fan - music superstar Drake.

"It was about my 20th season as a head coach," says the 52-year-old from the small town of Carroll in Iowa. "I had 10 or 11 years in England and there was things I was pulling out in the NBA finals that I was using back in 1995-96 in the British Basketball League - so it's all kind of come full circle."

Nurse arrived in the UK from Iowa in 1990 and his first impressions on the drive from Gatwick were of it being "really green". He remembers watching Eastenders on TV and eating Indian food, as well as going to the Royal Albert Hall to watch Eric Clapton.

But he says one of the reasons he stayed so long was the welcome he received. "The people were super friendly," he says.

"I immediately felt at ease from the moment I got there, with the people at the club. I only really planned to go over there for a year or two and ended up staying 11.

"I first went to England as a 22-year-old and I was just trying to work my craft and figure out if I was any good at it. I was just experimenting along the way and I think it all kind of built in to being able to handle that situation last year, so I give a lot of credit for the time I spent in England for sure."

Everywhere he went during his time in the UK he brought success - winning a total of eight trophies.

He ended up at the Brighton Bears where he was coach, general manager and part-owner.

After returning to to the US and having spells coaching teams in the NBA's development leagues, Nurse was hired as Toronto's assistant coach in 2013.

He got the top job in 2018 after Dwane Casey was fired following the Raptors' second-round play-off loss.

Nurse is one of British Basketball's rare global success stories, despite the NBA being an increasingly international league.

He was also part of the Team GB coaching set-up at the London 2012 Olympics and thinks more needs to be done to encourage and invest in the sport.

"Basketball is a tremendous worldwide sport that it seems the UK is missing out on," he said. "I do believe there is a lot of athleticism and a lot of kids who could probably become pretty good basketball players.

"There seems to still be a bit of an infrastructure problem, of enough kids having places to play and quality coaching."

Another American-born but British-made coaching talent who is hoping to follow in Nurse's footsteps is Fabulous Flournoy.

After more than 20 years in the BBL as both coach and player he has been hired as an assistant coach at the Raptors.

"He's a tremendously hard worker," Nurse said. "I liked how he studied the game - he shows a tremendous desire to improve himself.

Flournoy won 24 trophies in 18 years as head coach at the Newcastle Eagles.

"Nick holds true to who he is as a coach and more importantly as a person," Flournoy said. "He's always learning himself and always teaching and welcoming and open in terms of grafting. Every day is a new day and a new challenge and he invites that. He spreads that across with everyone within his staff.

"No-one is above or below with Nick's teaching philosophy. It's just we get there, we work hard and we work together and we do the best that we can with no limits on what we can do or achieve."