The Hill News

A former pro basketball player with a high-powered job recommended the Chicago Bulls current head coach to the team's owner, but it's not who you would expect. 

Education Secretary Arne Duncan first suggested that the Bulls should hire Tom Thibodeau as head coach when Thibodeau was still employed as an assistant for the Boston Celtics, according to Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf. 

{mosads}"Tom Thibodeau was first recommended to me by Arne Duncan,’’ Reinsdorf told the Chicago Sun-Times in an interview published Wednesday. "And that was two years earlier. The Celtics didn’t give us a chance to talk with him until after the playoffs, when they won the championship." 

President Obama and several of h! is advisers and aides are known to be avid basketball players, fans and, as it turns out, personnel experts. 

The story broke on the same day Obama is scheduled to hold a White House watch party for a Bulls game.

Obama and former senior adviser David Axelrod later commended Reinsdorf, who also owns the Chicago White Sox, on the hire during a Sox game in Washington, D.C. against the Nationals. 

‘‘First, David Axelrod arrived and said, ‘Thanks for hiring Thibodeau.’ Then a little while later, President Obama came in and the first thing he said to me was, ‘Great hire,'" Reinsdorf said.

Thibodeau was eventually hired before this season to coach the Chicago squad and the Bulls are enjoying one of their most successful regular seasons in recent memory. Their record is currently 44-18 and they are in second place in the Eastern Conference.

Duncan picked up his basketball knowledge as a player on the Harvard basketball team and later as a pro in Australia. Thibodeau served as an assistant at Harvard while Duncan played there.

Reinsdorf said he spoke with Duncan on multiple occasions about hiring the former Celtics assistant.