Nuggets head coach Brian Shaw opens up about guilt over tragic deaths of parents, sister

The burden of expectations and the weight of losses can consume a coach’s perspective in these circumstances, but that seems unlikely in Shaw’s case. As Bernard Goldberg documents in an HBO’s Real Sports profile that airs Tuesday, Shaw has survived and thrived as a player and a coach while battling through an unimaginable mental test: deep-seated guilt related to the tragic deaths of his parents and sister.

In June 1993, about five years after Shaw was a first-round pick in the 1988 draft, Shaw’s father fell asleep at the wheel after driving all night. As the car rolled over, it sent everyone — Shaw’s father, mother, sister and niece — from the vehicle. Only Brianna — Shaw’s 11-month-old niece, who was named after Shaw — survived, and she was transported to the hospital in critical condition. Shaw received an early-morning call from the coroner rather than the “We made it safe” call from his parents that he was expecting.

As if those horrific, life-altering circumstances weren’t enough, Shaw tells HBO Sports that he couldn’t help but feel that he played a direct role in the accident, that his parents — a mechanic and a daycare provider — would still be alive if he hadn’t purchased the car that Shaw’s father was driving as a gift to his family, and if he hadn’t purchased the Las Vegas house the family was driving to on that night.

“I said to myself, ‘If I hadn’t bought the house down there they wouldn’t be goin’ down there,’” Shaw says. “If I hadn’t got my father a new car they would o’ just flown down there — I ran over every scenario in my head. … At the time, you know, I just beat myself up over it.”

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