Steve Clifford understands the grind. Before becoming Charlotte’s head coach in 2013, Clifford’s NBA journey included four assistant-coaching stops, a decade-plus run that was preceded by college assistant-coaching gigs in Fairfield, Connecticut; East Carolina and Goffstown, New Hampshire. Without an NBA coaching background or a top college job on his résumé, Clifford struggled to earn recognition as a high-level coaching candidate.

“It’s always going to depend on management,” Clifford told Yahoo Sports. “We talked about that this year in the head coaches meeting. There are more people within management now. There are more people involved. Some with analytic backgrounds, some without a basketball or coaching backgrounds. That changes things.”

Portland coach Terry Stotts gets it, too. Stotts’ coaching career began in the CBA, where he developed a strong working relationship with George Karl that continued at Karl’s NBA stops in Seattle and Milwaukee. The Sonics and Bucks enjoyed successful runs with Stotts on staff, but it wasn’t until 2002, in Atlanta, that Stotts got his first head-coaching shot — and that was only after the Hawks fired Lon Kruger at midseason.

View photos (From left to right) David Vanterpool, Jay Larranaga, Jerry Stackhouse, Ryan Saunders and Adrian Griffin could be next in line for NBA head-coaching jobs. (Amber Matsumoto/Yahoo Sports) More

“There’s frustration when a job doesn’t come right away,” Stotts, who took over the Blazers in 2012, told Yahoo Sports. “But I believe that if you keep doing your job well, people will take notice.”

In the NBA, coaching hires are trendy. In the late ’90s/early 2000s, hiring high-profile college coaches (Kruger, Rick Pitino, John Calipari, Mike Montgomery, etc.) was en vogue. Former NBA head coaches with established track records have always been a safe hire.

In recent years, veteran assistant coaches have been getting opportunities — and succeeding. Clifford has established himself in Charlotte. The Nets are happy with Kenny Atkinson in Brooklyn. Brett Brown battled through four rebuilding years to become a Coach of the Year candidate in Philadelphia.

In the coming weeks, there could be as many as 11 head-coaching openings, and veteran assistants will get long looks. Who are they? On the condition of anonymity, Yahoo Sports asked more than three dozen high-ranking team executives to name two assistants whom they see as the top head-coaching prospects. The only criteria: Execs could not name assistants from their own staffs, and assistants could not have any NBA or major-college head-coaching experience.

View photos Toronto assistant Nick Nurse’s star is rising. (AP) More

Nick Nurse, Toronto: 16 Votes

Nurse, 50, is well-traveled: He was a player-coach in the British Basketball League in his early 20s, moved to the D-League in 2007 — where he became the first head coach in league history to lead two different teams to championships — before joining Dwane Casey’s staff in Toronto in 2013.

A respected offensive mind, Nurse is credited with leading the overhaul of Toronto’s offense this season, which has seen the Raptors evolve from an isolation-heavy, 3-point averse offense into a free-flowing one that fires up the third-most threes per game (32.9) in the NBA.

David Vanterpool, Portland: 13 Votes

Vanterpool, 45, has risen rapidly. He joined the Blazers’ bench in 2012 with Stotts after two seasons as a pro scout in Oklahoma City. In Portland, Vanterpool has worked closely with Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum – “He has done a remarkable job with our guards,” Stotts told Yahoo Sports – and is the de facto defensive coordinator on Stotts’ staff, leading a defense that ranks in the top 10 this season. Said Stotts: “He really thinks the game like a head coach.”

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