Former head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers, Phil Jackson, and current Lakers Executive VP, Jeanie Buss, are finally engaged after more than a decade of being together.
Buss tweeted a picture of the engagement ring Jackson proposed to her with on her Twitter account on Thursday:
Twitter family – Phil finally gave me that ring I wanted!:-) twitpic.com/bs8xc5
— Jeanie Buss (@JeanieBuss) January 4, 2013
Jackson and Buss started dating back in 2001 and have been together ever since. Despite all the ups and downs Jackson has experienced with the Lakers franchise and the Buss family in general, namely Jim Buss, the relationship between the two has endured and has now taken the next step.
Before the Lakers’ front office ultimately decided to hire Mike D’Antoni as the team’s new head coach following the firing of Mike Brown, Jackson was the frontrunner to land the job and coach the Lakers for a third time.
Unfortunately for Jackson, the Lakers decided to go with D’Antoni the night before Jackson was sent to make his decision on whether or not to return to the team. The late-night coop as Jackson refers to it as rubbed a lot of Lakers fans and the former coach of the team the wrong way, but it appears that he’s moving on with his life after coaching by finally settling down with his longtime girlfriend.