Dan Hurley ultimately decided to remain at UConn, turning down an opportunity to coach the Los Angeles Lakers. Hurley’s reasoning for the decision was explained by Adrian Wojnarowski.
“Start with the opportunity Dan Hurley has at UConn,” said Wojnarowski on Get Up on Tuesday morning. “As you said, to do something that hasn’t been done since John Wooden’s UCLA teams, that’s win a third straight NCA Championship. Probably never have that chance again as a coach. This is a unique time in his life and his career. That’s number one.
“Number two, Dan Hurley really studied everything that was re required to be an NBA coach and the adjustments he was going to have to make. As much as the Lakers wanted what Dan Hurley brought, his program building his player development, the way he can forge relationships with players. You know the great X’s and O’ acumen. He’s running a lot of stuff in college that’s been intriguing to NBA coaches who they want to steal from a little bit. or all of that, Dan Hurley was going to have to adjust and knew that he had to be ready to make the adjustments in temperament, in practice time, all the things that come with being an NBA coach from college basketball. And, ultimately, Dan Hurley wasn’t there yet on doing that.
“So they negotiated out a number almost $12 million a year it would have put him just behind [Gregg] Popovich, Steve Kerr, Ty Lou, coaches who have a combined 12 NBA championships and more than double what he was making at Connecticut. He had negotiated a new deal for himself with his agent weeks ago that’s going to be, I’m told, kind of in the $8 million plus range. It’ll put him among the highest paid coaches in college basketball, but they never negotiated off that, or leveraged off that with the Lakers. The Lakers was a singular moment for Dan Hurley and it wasn’t about getting his UConn number up. It already was up and that was before UConn even knew about the Laker conversations.
“I think in the end for Dan Hurley, he wasn’t ready to do the job. I think he loved what he heard in L.A. from Rob Pelinka, Jeanie Buss. He loved the idea of having Anthony Davis, LeBron James, and the group they have in the short-term. And then working with Pelinka over time with a six-year deal to draft players to find what Rob Pelinka told him would be Hurley-type players for the Lakers. He was going to have a hand in all of that
“But ultimately, for Dan Hurley, at 51 years old, wasn’t ready to make that move. And I think there was never really an instance in the last days of this where Dan Hurley told the Lakers, ‘Hey, if you hit this number I am coming.’ He wasn’t ready to come and it wasn’t about what the number was.
“Listen, the Lakers were taking some risk too that Hurley could make this adjustment that as great as he is that he was going to be a fully formed NBA coach and that offer you know certainly put him in the upper echelon of NBA coaches, so maybe this isn’t as much about the money as a lot of people were making when they saw it the initial numbers they came out yesterday.”