As the search for a new head coach of the Denver Nuggets drags on, Jazz assistant coach Phil Johnson has opted to take his name out of the running for the vacant position.
     
"Although the Nuggets never offered me the job, the longer the process took, the easier it was for me to make the decision to remain with the Jazz," Johnson said Wednesday. "I was never sure that I would leave, even if the offer would have been extended to me. It would have taken a lot for me to leave a situation I feel very good about."
     
Johnson's Utah colleagues had continued to back his bid for the post.
     
"We'd hate to lose him, but they'd be smart to hire him," Kevin O'Connor, the Jazz's vice president of basketball operations, had said Tuesday.