Bill Self reveals assistant coach Chase Buford left Kansas for job with Denver Nuggets

Kansas is about to have its team back in Lawrence soon for the start of the school year and, with that, preparation for the upcoming season. However, late in the offseason, the Jayhawks have lost a member of their staff.

On Friday, Bill Self revealed that Chase Buford is no longer on staff at Kansas, leaving to take an assistant job with the Denver Nuggets in the NBA. That leaves KU with an open seat on its bench that Self does intend to fill with a new coach pending a search.

“Chase just got hired by the Nuggets…You know, he got an assistant coach’s job, which is great for him and happy for him. He did a really good job here,” Self said. “I’m in the process of looking into some different things, but I haven’t done anything yet. I feel like I have the scope kind of narrowed down of what I think would be good for us, but I haven’t done anything yet.”

Buford spent one season on staff this past year as an assistant at Kansas, when the Jayhawks went 21-13 overall (11-9 in Big 12). He now joins the Nuggets as part of the staff under David Adelman, who’s entering his first season as the franchise’s full-time head coach after being the interim for their final 10 games last season after the firing of Mike Malone.

Now, in Denver, Buford will join another Rock Chalk alumnus in Christian Braun. The former KU sharp-shooter is coming off a career-best season in his third year in the association at 15.4 points (58% FG, 39.7% 3PT on 1.1 makes), 5.2 rebounds, 2.6 assists, and 1.1 steals per game.

As a player, Buford spent three seasons at Kansas from 2007-2010, appearing in 35 games. That included being part of the program’s four national title teams, including one of their two under Self, in his first year with the team in 2008.

Since then, Buford gained experience all around professional basketball, namely with several jobs around the NBA. He worked as a regional scout and then video coordinator with the Atlanta Hawks before becoming a coordinator of player development with the Chicago Bulls. Then, in bigger opportunities in the G-League, Buford became an assistant with the Erie Bayhawks in 2017 and the Delaware Blue Coats in 2018 before earning the job as head coach of the Wisconsin Herd in 2019. He’d then spent the previous three seasons coaching the Sydney Kings in the NBL in Australia.

Self still has four key assistants on the bench coming into this season. That gives him about two months now to fill that last role following Buford’s recent departure.