The Milwaukee Bucks have found their next head coach. The team reportedly reached a four-year agreement on Wednesday with Mike Budenholzer, a proven successful coach who was considered the frontrunner for the job since the search began two weeks ago.

On Thursday, the Bucks officially announced Budenholzer as their 16th head coach – and third in less than four months. He replaces interim coach Joe Prunty, who took over after Jason Kidd was fired on Jan. 22 and led Milwaukee to the playoffs.

Budenholzer, who met with general manager Jon Horst and team ownership during a second interview on Tuesday, was chosen over a half-dozen other candidates, including Spurs assistant and fellow finalist Ettore Messina.

"We are thrilled to welcome Mike Budenholzer as the head coach of the Milwaukee Bucks," Horst said. "Mike has played a key role in building successful teams throughout his career. He’s widely respected and has shown a special ability to teach and develop players. His leadership, basketball intellect, championship-level experience and communication skills make him the right fit to take our team to the next level."

Said Budenholzer, "I’m extremely grateful to the Bucks ownership group and Jon Horst to be named the next head coach of the Milwaukee Bucks. There are terrific people throughout the organization and together we have a tremendous opportunity to take the Bucks to the next level."

The 47-year-old Budenholzer spent the first 17 seasons of his coaching career as an in San Antonio, where he won four NBA titles, and the past five as head coach of the Atlanta Hawks. He was successful during his time in Atlanta, accumulating a 213-197 record and leading the Hawks to the playoffs four times, including a franchise-record, 60-win season in 2014-15, when they had the best record in the Eastern Conference and he was named NBA Coach of the Year.

Last year, following the departure of multiple important players in free agency and embracing an organizational rebuild, Atlanta went 24-58, the worst record in the East. After the season, Budenholzer and the team mutually agreed to part ways, despite the coach having two years and $14 million left on his contract.

"After a thorough coaching search, it was clear that Mike was the ideal choice as we enter into a new era of Bucks Basketball," Bucks owners Wes Edens, Marc Lasry and Jamie Dinan said in a statement. "Mike has demonstrated the ability to lead and communicate, and understands what it takes to build a winning culture. This move puts our organization in a terrific position as we work together toward our collective goal of sustained success and winning championships."

Budenholzer is regarded as a steady presence and a smart tactician with a keen basketball acumen. And, as we wrote last week, "his track record of developing and optimizing talent should be a massive eye-opener for Milwaukee. He was able to maximize the potential of players like Jeff Teague, DeMarre Carroll, and Kyle Korver, so there's reason to be optimistic that he could unlock the likes of Khris Middleton, Malcolm Brogdon and Thon Maker."

Not to mention, the Hawks never had any player as good as Giannis Antetokounmpo. They achieved far more team success, though, so the Bucks are clearly hoping Budenholzer can help improve not only the Greek Freak, but also the rest of their young roster, as well as imbue Milwaukee with some systematic coherence. His Atlanta teams were disciplined and efficient at both ends of the floor, playing a fluid, motion-based offense and an adaptable defensive scheme.

"I look forward to working with our group of young and exciting players and helping us evolve in many ways to succeed on the court," Budenholzer said. "The venues are also in place with an incredible, new state-of-the art arena and first-class Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin Sports Science Center.

"The tremendously supportive fans in Milwaukee and throughout Wisconsin are waiting and ready. Now it’s up to us to put all the pieces together, and I can't wait to get started."

According to ESPN, Budenholzer, who interviewed Monday with the Toronto Raptors, had breakfast with Antetokounmpo and Middleton in Milwaukee on Wednesday. This, from the ESPN report, is interesting:

The Bucks wanted the two players -- especially Antetokounmpo, the franchise star -- to have a sense of the prospective next Bucks coach and encouraged the players to sit down with Milwaukee's preferred candidate before the organization extended a formal offer, league sources said.

It is a relatively unprecedented move in a head-coaching search, but it clearly reflects the Bucks' determination to make Antetokounmpo and Middleton feel a part of the process.

Also, Hawks top assistant Darvin Ham, a (beloved-for-this-writer) former Bucks player, is expected to join Budenholzer, along with other members of the staff.

Expect top assistant Darvin Ham to join Mike Budenholzer in Milwaukee, per sources, along with most, if not all, of his former Hawks coaching staff. — David Aldridge (@daldridgetnt) May 17, 2018

A native of Holbrook, Ariz., Budenholzer is a 1993 graduate of Pomona College, where he received a bachelor’s degree in politics, philosophy and economics and was a four-year letterman in both basketball and golf. Following college, he played professionally in Denmark for the Vejle Basketball Klub, averaging a team-high 27.5 points per game during the 1993-94 season and getting his start in coaching, serving as the head coach for two different teams in the Vejle system.

Hiring a coach was the first of many important decisions the Bucks had to make this offseason. Budenholzer was the safest and most obvious choice; we’ll see if he was the best one.