Mike Budenholzer, Ettore Messina interview again with Bucks

The search for the next coach of the Milwaukee Bucks is heating up.

Members of the team's front office and ownership group held second interviews with finalists Mike Budenholzer and Ettore Messina on Tuesday, according to a league source. That list of finalists may not be complete. As of now, no other candidates have officially been ruled out.

Budenholzer's inclusion as a finalist for the position was reported Monday. It also comes as no surprise considering Budenholzer's strong résumé, which includes 17 years as an assistant with the San Antonio Spurs before spending five seasons as the head coach of the Atlanta Hawks, a stint that included winning the 2015 NBA Coach of the Year award.

Messina's second interview — after being the first person interviewed by the team on May 5 — was a new wrinkle first reported by ESPN and confirmed by the Journal Sentinel early Tuesday.

The two men each have extensive coaching experience, including links to the Spurs. Budenholzer, who opened his NBA coaching career as an assistant with the Spurs from 1996-2013, has the most NBA coaching experience of any of the candidates who are known to have interviewed with the Bucks in the past week and a half.

The other known interviewees of the Bucks include David Blatt, Steve Clifford, Becky Hammon, Joe Prunty and Monty Williams.

Of all the candidates, Messina, 58, has the most overall coaching experience.

Messina started his coaching career in 1989, leading various high-level teams in Italy, Russia and Spain, including the Italian national team for two separate stretches. He's coached Virtus Bologna and Benetton Treviso in Italy, CSKA Moscow in Russia and Real Madrid in Spain and he's won everywhere he's gone.

Among Messina's accolades are four EuroLeague titles, two EuroLeague coach of the year awards, four Italian League championships, five Russian League championships and four Russian League coach of the year awards. Messina was also named one of the EuroLeague's top 10 coaches ever in 2008 and in 2009 was inducted into the Italian Basketball Hall of Fame.

He joined the NBA as a consultant for the Los Angeles Lakers in 2011-'12 and joined his first NBA bench as an assistant with the Spurs beginning in 2014. Messina has served as the No. 2 to San Antonio head coach Gregg Popovich, including coaching three games this postseason following the death of Popovich's wife.

Messina, who also interviewed for the head coaching position in Charlotte that went to fellow Spurs assistant James Borrego, would become just the second European-born head coach in the NBA if he received the job with the Bucks or any other team. Earlier this month, the Phoenix Suns hired Igor Kokoskov, a native of Serbia, as their new head coach.

Now in the finalist phase, Milwaukee's coaching search could gain added urgency. Budenholzer has been linked to the newly-opened Toronto Raptors coaching job, which was vacated Wednesday when Toronto fired Dwane Casey, who is sure to draw interest around the league but has not yet been linked to Milwaukee's vacancy. The Bucks and Raptors both appear interested in Budenholzer's services, which has the potential to result in both teams bidding to win him over.

Budenholzer is coming off a mostly successful stint in Atlanta, which included a 60-win season in 2014-'15. He and the Hawks mutually agreed to part ways on April 26 following a 24-58 season that is expected to be followed by a rebuild. Budenholzer had two years and $14 million left on his contract.

“It’s time for both of us to move on,” Hawks general manager Travis Schlenk said. “We feel like it’s in the best interest of both parties.”

During his time in Atlanta, Budenholzer spent nearly two years, from June 2015 to May 2017, as the team's president of basketball operations with final say on basketball decisions. Whether the Bucks would venture to create a similar position — or whether Budenholzer would want to perform that dual role again — remains to be seen, though it does add an element of intrigue to the proceedings, especially with a relatively new front office in place led by general manager Jon Horst who was hired less than a year ago.