Dissecting Dan Hurley’s Decision - Kevin Stacom
Kevin Stacom, Sports Analyst
Dissecting Dan Hurley’s Decision - Kevin Stacom
I think why this drama centered around what would finally be Dan Hurley’s decision of whether he would or would not accept the Lakers coaching position was so riveting that the suspense was fueled by a great plot and subplots galore.
Hurley, as most basketball fans are aware, comes from a very well-known basketball family. His father (Bob Sr) was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2010. The induction came after a legendary career as a high school coach at St. Anthony’s in Jersey City, producing numerous Catholic and State Titles and many Division 1 and NBA players. What Bob Sr. became famous for was not just what he accomplished but for how he did it- bringing discipline and tough love to young guys who desperately needed direction and structure in their lives to help them navigate the hardscrabble setting of Jersey City.
Like his brother Bobby (who went on to become a 1st team All-American at Duke, winner of two back-to-back NCAA titles, 91-92, and the 7th pick of the 1993 NBA draft), Dan grew up in that atmosphere. Obviously, that experience played a big part in forming his personality and character.
A quick look at Dan Hurley’s coaching career is useful in giving context to his recently concluded dilemma and decision-making process. Instead of getting lost in his famous father’s and brother’s basketball shadow, he quietly went about setting the groundwork for his own impact on the game:
1996-97 - assistant to his father at St.Anthony’s
1997-2001 - assistant coach at Rutgers
2001- 2010 - Head coach at St. Benedict’s, Newark, NJ, a nine-year stint with a 223 win/ 21 loss record, coached 4 McDonalds All-Americans, and four teams in the top 5 nationally
2010-2012 - Head coach at Wagner College Turned around the program Last year 25/6 school record for wins 24-12 NEC play
2012-2018- Head coach URI- 6 seasons 91-43. Last four years with 2 NCAA appearances and an NIT birth Last season 2018- top 25 in both National poles for final seven weeks of the season-16 game winning streak Most wins (91) over a 4-year span in program’s history.
The point is that although he emerged from a well-known family, nothing was handed to him. He has paid his dues and won at every level- High School, mid-major, and high major, turning around 3 different programs in the process- the most recent, of course, being UConn which was moribund at the time of his arrival in the lackluster American Athletic Conference Once given a viable platform with the rejoining of the Big East Conference, he quickly retooled in a few years, dramatically winning back to back NCAA Championships.
Obviously, Dan Hurley is no fool, and he’s adjusted well at every point of his ascension in his career. But you couldn’t help but imagine what a juxtaposition and contrast of culture and personality his acceptance of the LA Lakers’ coaching job would have presented. It would have been reminiscent of a Ray Donovan, Woody Allen in Annie Hall, or, currently, Larry David storyline. The quintessential East Coast character supplanted into the LaLa land West Coast tinsel town.
Money is Money, and the initial estimates of LA’s offer were extravagant, ranging upwards of 100-150 million, and most pundits had surmised that he had no choice but to take the offer. Who would have begrudged him for that? On top of that, you could imagine the heady experience of a former Jersey City gym rat entering a room with the King (LeBron), Magic Johnson, Jeanie Buss, and GM Rob Pelinka.
I have to credit our old friend Rick Pitino, who, in an interview in the NY Post on Friday, induced the following headline:
“Rick Pitino believes Dan Hurley will stay put at UConn, won’t jump to NBA yet.” Some of his more prescient comments included, “What I’m hearing- and I have no inside information that his father (Bob Hurley Sr) and his wife (Andrea) are very strong in his life, and they don’t want to go…I think he’s going to try it, no different than John Calipari tried it or I tried it…..I don’t think he’s going to take the job, but I think he’s going to try the pros someday.
Rick, of course, speaks from experience since he signed a 10-year/ 70 million contract with the Celtics in 1997, leaving Kentucky, a move which he described recently in a podcast, as the biggest regret of his coaching career.
He went on to say, “But one thing I can tell you is, when you make that type of money, it really doesn’t matter. He has more than enough money in Connecticut. Money is not a factor. He’s going to live great either way, so money should not come into the equation. Pitino made the comments while attending the races at Saratoga this past weekend, supporting his friend and major St John’s benefactor Mike Repole, who has two horses that ran in the 156th Belmont Stakes. If Rick’s handicapping on the horses was as accurate as his prognostication of Hurley’s decision, he should have made a lot of money.
The two other factors that probably weighed into the Coaches decision to stay were that the Laker’s job will not be that easy right away- not a lot of cap space in which to maneuver, a still effective, but aging superstar (LeBron), and a fragile center in Anthony Davis, and while the money is substantial-70 million over six years- it is not that dramatically different after UConn will most likely bump him up to about 8,5 year (rumored increase).
At about 1:30 Monday afternoon, I called a friend of mine who is very involved in the UConn program. He was fairly despondent after just having finished a conversation with the UConn Athletic Director, who told him he was 99% sure that Hurley was leaving. Little did they know that the coach was about to deliver a rare positive storybook ending to this Hollywood drama.
It’s no longer possible to romanticize college athletics as a purer form of the sport than its professional counterpart, considering the uneasy unregulated mess that it has devolved into. But nonetheless, it is possible that one very successful coach at this point in his career took into account his pedigree shaped by his humble origins and decided his best fit where he brings the most and best value to all those around him is where he is presently situated- and it wasn’t all about the money.