The night David Adelman got married changed the life of the Nuggets’ new coach in multiple ways.

First, he married his bride, Jenny, the mother of their two children. During the wedding reception, Adelman’s father, Rick, a longtime NBA coach, informed his son’s boss at Portland’s Lincoln High School, Jeff Peeler, that he would soon have to find a new boys basketball coach.

“That happened. We shook hands. I was not happy and happy at the same time,” Peeler, the athletic director who gave the younger Adelman his first head-coaching job, told The Denver Gazette on Thursday. “He said that he had felt David had gotten to the point where he was ready. … He said ‘I think you’re about to lose him to me.’”

Peeler was conflicted for good reason. It didn’t take long for the 20-something-year-old hire to change the basketball culture at the public school in Portland’s Goose Hollow neighborhood. Unfortunately for Peeler, David’s basketball acumen had become undeniable just as quickly.

“He was obsessing over out-of-bounds plays, quick hitters and press breaks,” Peeler said.

“I didn’t want him to leave. I argued with him, but he was beyond what we’re doing. That was clear.”

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Rick Adelman added his son, always a quick learner and affable personality, to his Minnesota staff as a player-development coach ahead of the 2011-12 season. Rick retired from coaching after the 2013-14 season and transitioned to an advisory role. David was promoted to assistant coach in his father’s final season with the Timberwolves.

“I brought him in the league just to get him going, but then he’s done everything on his own to this point,” Rick told The Denver Gazette. “I’m very proud of him. The fortunate thing is he has a good team he’s taking over.”

David remained in Minnesota for two more seasons after his father’s 23rd, and final, coaching season. He worked under Flip Saunders – the father of former Nuggets assistant, Ryan, who David opted not to retain alongside a few other former assistants and player-development staff members – and Sam Mitchell.

“In Minnesota, my father trusted me, onto Flip Saunders, Sam Mitchell,” David said at his introductory press conference at Ball Arena last week.

After Minnesota, Adelman spent a season on Frank Vogel’s staff in Orlando. Nuggets forward Aaron Gordon was a member of the Magic that season and reunited with “DA” after Denver traded for its current starting power forward ahead of the 2021 trade deadline.

“I love DA,” Gordon said after Oklahoma City eliminated the Nuggets in Game 7 of the second-round series last month. “I hope he’s here next year. I hope he’s the coach. I hope he gets an entire training camp and a whole offseason … to figure out his philosophy. I had DA in Orlando, we have DA here, DA’s great. He was excellent for us.”

Adelman officially shed his interim tag roughly a month after the Nuggets’ season ended in Game 7 against the Thunder on May 18. The wealth of experience from a life lived largely around the NBA certainly helped.

“When you’re around those people, you see how they run their business and their process. It’s kind of a cheat code,” Denver’s new coach said, “It helps you when you get this opportunity.”

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Save for some stints as the Nuggets’ Summer League coach, the last time Adelman served as a head coach prior to Michael Malone’s firing with three games left in the regular season came in 2011. Lincoln High School was looking for someone to turn around a program that was seeking more success. Peeler had plenty of reasons to pick the “quirky savant” with strong basketball bloodlines to be the one to turn around Cardinals’ program, but Rick wasn’t the one on the athletic director’s mind. Kathy Naro (nee Adelman) and Gene Potter’s names mattered more.

“People joke with me that Rick Adelman is a big name here in Portland. That really didn’t mean anything to me,” Peeler said.

“What meant something to me was he was Kathy Adelman’s little brother and Gene Potter’s assistant.”

Potter coached David – and former NBA forward and current Golden State Warriors general manager Mike Dunleavy Jr. – to a state championship at Jesuit High School in 1999. David went on to join Potter’s staff to start his coaching career.

“They are the standard of high school basketball here in Oregon,” Peeler said of the private institution.

Kathy, a state-championship winning coach in her own right, was Potter’s comparison on the girls’ side.

“She is the standard, as far as I’m concerned, for girls basketball in the state of Oregon,” Peeler said.

Rick attended some of his son’s early practices as a head coach. What he saw was convincing enough to offer his son a promotion.

“He had a feel for what he wanted to do. I think more importantly he had a feel for how to deal with people,” Rick said. “I think that’s so important in the NBA. You have to deal with personalities. Everybody is their own personality. They each have their own ideas, and he has to be able to relate to those people and find a way to get the best out of them in relation to what the team is doing.”

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The turnaround at Lincoln was impressive, but it wasn’t perfect.

The latest in the Adelman coaching lineage inherited a team of football players moonlighting as hoopers in his first season, according to Peeler’s memory. That group went to the second round of the state playoffs.

“I was confident with him, as soon as I got to work with him,” Peeler said.

Before long, David had his Cardinals believing that taking a charge was not an exceptional play but the expectation. That’s something Peeler said Adelman took from Potter. After the second-round exit, David led Lincoln to the state quarterfinals in four consecutive seasons.

“Only Jesuit accomplishes something like that,” Peeler said.

Adelman led Lincoln to the 2009 state championship against his alma mater and former coach. Potter led Jesuit to a 63-41 victory, an “annoying” result for Peeler.

During that season David was arrested for driving under the influence for the second time and was later found guilty. Peyton Chapman, who remains the principal at Lincoln, declined to fire Adelman. She did not respond to multiple interview requests from The Denver Gazette.

According to a report from The Oregonian, a father upset about his son’s playing time hired a private investigator to follow Adelman. That included a trip to a local bar and then to a Taco Bell. The investigator tipped off police that Adelman had been drinking and got behind the wheel, though the informant later admitted they overstated the amount Adelman had consumed. Adelman registered a .14 on a breathalyzer test, well above the legal limit, according to the report.

“People don’t know who these people are,” Adelman said, naming Potter, Peeler and Chapman, in his first official press conference.

“But they’re the reason I’m here.”

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The 23rd coach in Nuggets history has avoided trouble for nearly 20 years. He has since become a father to a son and a daughter who can often be found spending time around the team before and after games. David was a Trail Blazers ball boy during his father’s time coaching in Portland.

“I had a lot of fun with David,” Rick said.

“He worked with all the teams and worked with our team. I got to take him on a couple of trips with me. It was a good opportunity just to be with him by himself.”

The previous Nuggets coach also came from a basketball family. Michael Malone often said his father, Brendan, didn’t want his son to become an NBA coach because of the cruel nature of the job. Malone was fired early in his second season in Sacramento. The Kings were 11-13, while their star, DeMarcus Cousins, battled viral meningitis. The Nuggets gave Malone his second head-coaching gig. He led Denver to its first championship in 2023 but was fired less than two years later with the Nuggets on the verge of a seventh-consecutive playoff berth.

Rick never had any hangups about his children getting into the family business.

“I never felt that way,” the coach with the ninth-most wins in NBA history said.

“When I got the job in Minnesota, I had a unique opportunity in that I was able to bring David and my other son, who’s no longer with us, RJ, bring them both to Minnesota with me. … It was a great opportunity for me. He wanted to coach. I mean, if he wants to do that, then make the most of it. So far, he’s made the most of it.”

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David went 3-0 in pressure-packed games to close the regular season and get the Nuggets the four seed in the Western Conference. He won his first playoff series in seven games against the Clippers and took the Thunder to seven games in the second round.

“When he had to take over in a tough situation, he handled it very well. He showed that he’s ready to coach a team,” Rick said. “I’m very happy for him, and very proud of him.”

Players voiced their support for Adelman after the final game of the season, and the support continued as Jamal Murray, Jalen Pickett and Julian Strawther attended the introductory press conference.

“He’s one of them guys that’s always around the game. He loves the game of basketball,” Strawther said. “The way he thinks the game, it’s different for a lot of people. I definitely have a lot of respect.”

Team president Josh Kroenke cited David’s ability to connect with the players and get them to buy into the collective goal as one of the reasons he was confident the 44-year-old was the right man to lead the Nuggets moving forward. That’s something David has been able to do dating back to his earliest days as a coach. Peeler remembered the post-game locker room after Adelman’s first season at Lincoln ended.

“I watched guys that never played going up and shaking his hand and hugging him, thanking him for the greatest experience they’ve ever had in high school athletics,” Peeler said.

“You’ve got a special coach there if the bench players, the role players feel valued, they’re being held to the same standard in practice that the main guy is. … It’s just gold.”

Now, Adelman’s primary goal is to do something he’s yet to do as a head coach – win a championship.

“When we come back together, when we reconvene as a team, I think we’re more than ready to take the next step,” David said.

“I feel extremely blessed to have one of these 30 jobs and to be the head coach of the Denver Nuggets.”