After spending decades in the college and NBA ranks as a head coach and assistant, Rex Walters had a year to just focus on being a dad during the 2024-25 basketball season.
Walters, a former NBA player who served as the head coach at Florida Atlantic and San Francisco before becoming an NBA assistant for the Detroit Pistons, New Orleans Pelicans and Charlotte Hornets, found himself at home after Charlotte let him go in a wholesale coaching staff switch after the 2024 season.
His one year completely away from the game taught him he was still itching to coach. But, he wanted to find somewhere to do it close to his family.
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So, Walters started looking for jobs in metro Detroit and applied for the newly vacant boys basketball head coaching position at Waterford Kettering shortly after watching a tournament in the school’s gym.
“I actually went to a tournament for a group of kids I worked out in the Lake Orion area who were playing in Waterford,” Walters said. “I went into the gym and said, ‘Wow, this is a really nice gym, nice school.’
“And then, within two weeks, I saw the ad saying they were looking for a coach and applied.”
The job was a perfect fit for Walters, who lives with his family in Clarkston. After he was let go from the Pelicans in 2021, they opted to move back to Michigan as a permanent base. First to Rochester Hills, and then to Clarkston. They stayed as he worked on the Hornets staff under coach Steve Clifford.
“I asked my family where they wanted to live, and they all said Michigan,” Walters said. “They love Michigan, love the area. They had friendships and relationships with people so we moved back and we’ve been back since then.”
He is now coaching close to home — less than a 15-minute drive from his house — with a chance to return to the high school ranks since his first job after his professional playing career as an assistant at Blue Valley Northwest High School in Kansas over 20 years ago.
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His youngest son, Ace Walters, is still at the high school level, but will remain at Clarkston and play for the Wolves’ basketball team.
“I always tell people, even in recruiting, even coaching NBA players, the most fun year I had was being an assistant coach at the high school level,” Walters said. “… It was close to home. I could still be around my kids every day.”
Walters replaces former coach Steve Emert, who resigned from the position, according to school officials.
“(Walters’) work ethic, his enthusiasm −not only for the game of basketball, but for coaching the kids and their futures — it is really important to us.” Waterford Kettering athletic director Allison Sartorious said.
He is taking over a Kettering team that finished 1-22 in 2024-25 and has 10 wins over the last three seasons.
Walters will lean on the decades of experience he gained as a coach and player. He played for Hall of Famer Roy Williams at Kansas and another, Miami Heat coach Pat Riley, in the NBA. He coached at three colleges, Valporaiso (assistant), Florida Atlantic and San Francisco, before taking over the Pistons’ G-League team, then called the Grand Rapids Drive. He then joined the Pistons on Stan Van Gundy’s staff, and followed him to New Orleans after another stint as a college assistant before joining Clifford in Seattle.
“I want our kids to understand work ethic, so it is simple,” Walters said. “I played for some great, great coaches — Stan Van Gundy, Steve Clifford — and they say it in different ways but it all comes down to working hard. … They have to have a work ethic, they have to learn their craft and they have to learn how to work with people.”
The work starts this summer. He has begun planning out summer workouts and camps for his players under the MHSAA guidelines for off-season workouts and a strength and conditioning program.
Honing the craft and establishing a baseline of effort will be the main focus, rather than a “fixed” goal of an improved number in the win column. Once the proper foundation is laid, Walters said is confident that success can follow.
“Pat Riley always used to say to us when I played in Miami, ‘if you play the right way, the ball will find the net,'” Walters said. “And I also believe if you play the right way, you are going to win a lot of games.”
Jared Ramsey covers high school sports for the Detroit Free Press. Contact him at jramsey@freepress.com; Follow Jared on X or Bluesky.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Waterford Kettering hires former Pistons assistant Rex Walters as boys basketball coach
Reporting by Jared Ramsey, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
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