The Warriors will enter the 2026-27 season carrying an unfamiliar absence. As the franchise prepares for another year with its veteran core largely intact, the Dubs also found a way to keep one of its most influential basketball minds close. The Warriors announced Wednesday that they will honor late HoF coach Don Nelson throughout the season.
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A setting that stages a tribute to two different eras of the franchise.
Nelson passed away on August 9 at the age of 86, and the Warriors will now wear a special “Nellie” patch on their uniforms for the entire 2026-27 campaign. According to the team’s announcement, the honorary patch will sit above the IREN badge on the upper-left side of the uniform.
It is a small addition visually, but the name carries considerable weight in Golden State.
Nelson spent 11 seasons coaching the Warriors across two separate stints, compiling 422 regular-season victories with the franchise. His first run, from 1988 to 1995, produced one of the most entertaining teams in franchise history: Run TMC.
Led by Tim Hardaway, Mitch Richmond, and Chris Mullin, those Warriors played with a pace and freedom that reflected Nelson’s larger basketball philosophy. He embraced unconventional lineups, versatile players and offensive mismatches long before those ideas became staples of the modern NBA.
His influence became even more apparent when he returned to Golden State in 2006.
That second stint produced the ‘We Believe Warriors’, a team that remains one of the defining underdog stories in franchise history. In the 2007 playoffs, Nelson led the eighth-seeded Warriors past the 67-win Dallas Mavericks in the opening round, making the Warriors the first No.8 seed to defeat a No. 1 seed in a seven-game series.
The Warriors entered that matchup with 25 fewer regular-season wins than Dallas, the largest such gap ever overcome by a team winning an NBA playoff series.
It also came against Nelson’s former team, adding another layer to one of the most memorable moments of his career.
The Warriors’ connection to Nelson, however, extends beyond those two teams. Across 31 seasons as an NBA HC, he accumulated 1,335 regular-season wins. The most in league history when he retired in 2010.
He also won three Coach of the Year awards and became one of only three coaches, alongside Gregg Popovich and Pat Riley, to claim the honor three times.
Before becoming one of basketball’s great innovators, Nelson also enjoyed a successful playing career. He spent 11 seasons with the Celtics and won five NBA championships. The franchise later retired his No.19 jersey.
Now, the Warriors will carry his name into a new season.
The timing gives the tribute another dimension. The Warriors head into the 2026-27 campaign without the kind of dramatic roster change. Instead, it continued with a group built around Stephen Curry and the franchise’s established core. That puts added importance on continuity.
Few figures represent the Warriors’ basketball identity across generations more clearly than Nelson.
The “Nellie” band will serve as more than a memorial. As the Warriors try to find another path, they will also spend the season honoring the legendary coach.
The coach who helped teach the franchise that basketball need not always follow convention.