Two sons of former Seattle Sonics square off in NBA Finals

At the same time that speculation of a Seattle Sonics return is as high as it has been in over a decade, the NBA Finals is set to feature two key figures with Sonics connections.

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On one side is the San Antonio Spurs, whose head coach is Seattle native Mitch Johnson, who won a pair of Washington state basketball championships as a high school player for O’Dea. He’s looking to add a second NBA title to his family, as his father is the late John Johnson, a member of the 1979 championship SuperSonics team.

On the other side is the New York Knicks, who are led on the floor by three-time All-Star guard Jalen Brunson. He’s the son of Rick Brunson, who played nine seasons as a point guard in the NBA, including a stint with the Sonics in 2005-06.

The Johnson family clearly has the stronger ties to Seattle of the two.

John Johnson played the final five of his 12 NBA seasons with the Sonics, and started every game for Seattle in 1978-79 while averaging 11 points, five rebounds and 4.4 assists. He was even better during the playoff run to the one and only title in franchise history, averaging 12.2 points, 6.8 rebounds, 5.4 assists and a steal per game in 17 postseason games in 1979.

As for the 39-year-old Mitch Johnson, not only is he a former preps star from the area, but he started his coaching career as an intern at Seattle U in 2011 after he played at Stanford in college. This is technically his first season as the Spurs head coach, but he also led the team in 2024-25 as the interim coach serving in the absence of Gregg Popovich. Johnson joined the Spurs coaching staff as an assistant in 2019.

On top of it all, Johnson’s Spurs knocked out the Oklahoma City Thunder in the Western Conference Finals last weekend. There’s nothing that could endear him to Sonics fans more than that.

Rick Brunson’s time in Seattle was short. He played just four games for the team, though he was a member of the Sonics for a 57-game period before being claimed on waivers by the Houston Rockets in March 2006. Jalen Brunson was 9 years old when his father was with the Sonics.

Rick Brunson is currently an assistant coach for the Knicks, whose leading scorer in both the regular season and playoffs has been his son.

Jalen Brunson paid homage to his dad’s playing career last year with a special pair of Nike Kobe 5 shoes dubbed the “What the Rick” colorway that featured colors of teams Rick played for in the NBA – including the Sonics.

 

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Game 1 of the NBA Finals between Mitch Johnson’s Spurs and Jalen Brunson’s Knicks is set for 5:30 p.m. Wednesday night. The TV broadcast will be on ABC, and the radio broadcast will be joined in progress at 6 p.m. on Seattle Sports 710 AM and the Seattle Sports app.

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