Defending NBA champions Golden State Warriors will host the New Orleans Pelicans on NBA Opening Night on Tuesday (Wednesday morning in Australia) but will be without head coach Steve Kerr due to complications from a recent back surgery.

ESPN confirms the report stating that assistant head coach and former player Luke Walton will handle the team in place of Kerr, who led the Warriors to the NBA title as a rookie coach and the franchise’s first championship since 1975. The Warriors-Pelicans opening day match-up is the first for the teams since Golden State swept New Orleans in the first round of the Western Conference Playoffs last season.

"Even if you ask Steve, he doesn't know," Warriors general manager Bob Myers stated in the ESPN report about the status of Kerr, who had surgery on his back in late July. "Basketball is everything he's ever known and loved. So you can relate to that. You can know he'd do anything to be out here in full capacity."

Kerr reportedly suffered the injury while coaching the team in the NBA Finals against the LeBron James-led Cleveland Cavaliers.

The 50-year-old Kerr, who played for multiple NBA teams from 1988 to 2002, led the Warriors to a 67-15 record in the regular season, the best mark in the entire league. The team went 16-5 in the postseason beating the Pelicans, Memphis Grizzlies in the second round, 4-2, Houston Rockets in the West Finals, 4-1 and the Cavaliers, 4-2 in each best-of-seven series to go all the way to the NBA title.

Kerr’s status is still indefinite and it’s unknown when he will able to rejoin the Warriors, which faces the Pelicans (twice), Houston Rockets, Grizzlies and Los Angeles Clippers in their first five games of the regular season.

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