Minnesota Loses a Basketball Icon, but Flip Saunders' Legacy Is in Good Hands

Flip Saunders rose to be one of the most powerful men in the NBA and still radiated a small-town warmth that is hard to come by in this ever-growing big-business league.

If you’re less than six feet tall in any prominent NBA job, you usually have—or have to develop—a harshness which aggressively conveys to those around you that size is not the measure of a man.

The 5’11” Saunders wasn’t about any little-man complex or power trip.

As we take time now to celebrate the contributions of Saunders, who died Sunday at the age of 60 after complications from Hodgkin lymphoma, it’s an opportunity to remember his unwavering commitment to keep the game fun, lively and creative.

You could tell just how much he loved this game.

And that unto itself is a gift he gave everyone whose path he crossed. In the way he spoke, acted and taught, Saunders made clear through his vibrancy that basketball, in every way, charged him up.

So you came away feeling charged up about it, too.

It was therefore never a surprise that those who got that feeling from the very beginning, when Saunders was an undersized guard at the University of Minnesota, trusted him to the point of giving him his biggest breaks in coaching later on.

Bill Musselman was Saunders’ coach with the Golden Gophers, and Musselman’s son, Eric, hired Flip in 1988 to be head coach of the Rapid City Thrillers that Bill used to coach.

That was the start of Saunders’ wildly successful CBA coaching tenure.

Then it was Kevin McHale, Saunders’ college teammate, who brought him up to the NBA so they could run the Minnesota Timberwolves together.

They got the potential and trust of a kid named Kevin Garnett to make that ride a lot more fun.

One of just four men in the NBA to hold the dual power of coach and general manager in his second tenure with the Timberwolves, Saunders swung the February trade of free-agent-to-be Thaddeus Young to bring Garnett back from the Brooklyn Nets.

The move had pseudo-tank ramifications with how little a sore-kneed Garnett played last spring (and how well Young played to help Brooklyn make the playoffs instead of helping Minnesota). The Timberwolves wound up landing the top overall pick and drafted Karl-Anthony Towns.

The trade also energized the local fan base with nostalgia and the hope of Garnett’s ongoing mentoring influence, which is continuing this season with Garnett back on a team full of kids.

With Saunders gone, it only adds to the leadership value Garnett provides.

That outward fire of Garnett is a sharp contrast to the gentler sincerity of Saunders, but we have no doubt about how much both men loved basketball, Minnesota and the Timberwolves.

Saunders’ contributions to Minnesota, dating back to his college days, will not be forgotten by the locals who have a complex about people leaving. He was far more than a guy who coached a mean matchup zone defense. In Minnesota, he was this generation’s Bud Grant.

Saunders addressed the issue of local allegiance himself after Kevin Love asked to be traded, saying: “Minnesota people are pretty loyal. You turn on Minnesota, they don’t forgive you. So I think people probably appreciated him while he was here. But you leave under the terms that he did, just the way Minnesota people are, they’re not pretty forgiving along those lines.”

It should also be noted it won't be just Garnett continuing the legacy.

Saunders’ only son, Ryan, is a Timberwolves assistant coach.

Ryan, 29, worked his way up without his dad around as a Washington Wizards assistant in recent years and has quickly carved out a niche with his expertise in player development and stat-efficiency analytics.

Ryan was in charge of the past two Timberwolves’ summer-league teams, much to Flip’s delight. That relationship was known to all around the franchise as something special, a beautiful evolution of Flip from father to mentor to friend.

Flip is gone now, but the resemblance in Ryan’s eyes is impossible to miss. Ryan will continue to make his own mark in basketball.

Flip’s mark sure left all around him feeling great about the game.

Kevin Ding is an NBA senior writer for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter, @KevinDing.