[TomWilkinson]

Miami Heat head coach Stan Van Gundy quit as head coach on Monday to spend more time with his family. General Manager Pat Riley takes over as head coach immediately.

"I was happy for him when I hired him 11 years ago," Riley said. "I was happy for him when I stepped aside and gave him an opportunity that was well-deserved. And I am happy for him today, absolutely."

"I think I know my way around a 94-by-50 court," Riley said. "I know what the hell I'm doing when I'm out there. But right now, I'm a little bit lost. So I'm going to depend a lot on the staff that we have presently. But no, I really wasn't thinking about replacements."

Van Gundy's job has been in question since the Heat lost Game #7 of last year?s Eastern Conference finals to Detroit. "If I'm getting forced out, I would have gotten absolutely every dollar on my contract and walked out the door," Van Gundy said. "That's not what happened here. ... Anybody who's speculating otherwise has to do so in total disregard of the facts of the situation."

Van Gundy is a total family man and said he has had enough of being away from his family for most of the year. "That's just not enough any more for me. It's just not enough," Van Gundy said. "I mean, it's been like that for my kids' entire lives. I've got a 14-year-old daughter and it started to hit me when I started thinking about her birthday, which was last month. I've got four more years left with her. Four. And then she'll be off to college and I'm just not willing to sacrifice any more of those four more years."

"I can't believe people have that big a problem actually believing that someone would actually want to spend time with their family," Van Gundy said. "I don't know why that's so hard for people to buy into."

"I regret the timing," Van Gundy said. "I think that for the team, it stinks. The timing of it stinks. And I wish that I could have made the decision in the offseason, but in the offseason, you don't feel like this."