Lakers forget about JJ Redick and target UConn’s Dan Hurley as potential head coach – Basketball Insiders
The Lakers are searching for the best coach to replace Darvin Ham this summer, after letting him go at the end of a campaign that stretched all the way to the first round of the playoffs. After two months of searching for options, recent reports suggest they are preparing a long-term offer for UConn men’s basketball recruit Dan Hurley.
Coach Geno Auriemma, who coaches the women’s team at the University of Connecticut, was asked recently about this possibility and revealed that he was talking to Dan last week about how they would live if they were given a chance in the NBA.
“I leaned back and said, ‘Hey, I think you can win more championships with the Lakers than a guy who’s never been coached,'” Auriemma said. The Dan Patrick Show. “He just looked at me and nodded, and we had a good laugh.
REPORT: Dan Hurley “highly rated” accepts Lakers job, and it’s his if he wants it, using @wojespn
Laker fans, do you think Hurley will take the job? pic.twitter.com/64PpubzPKA
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Even though Geno admitted he had no knowledge of the purple and gold franchise at the time, he said it would be a sad day for Connecticut if Hurley left.
“This morning, I wake up again, voila,” the strategist told Patrick. “I don’t know what’s going on. It would be a bad day for UConn if this happened. It would be a great, great day for Dan Hurley, and I’m sure a great day for Dan Hurley.”
Going to Los Angeles will definitely be a game changer for Dan, as he already has his future secured in Connecticut. After winning back-to-back national titles in just six years on the job, you can understand why the Lakers would want to hire him as their head coach.
Auriemma knows Hurley would have continued to win the title if he stayed. “The state of college basketball is a mess,” he asserted. “If anyone can handle it, it’s Danny. He coaches this program as if it were a high school program, as he once coached at St. Benedict. Their player development program is top notch.”
He even dared to say that his colleague is not taking the job. “If Danny left and somebody said to me, ‘He just took this NBA job,’ I wouldn’t say any particular city, I’d say, ‘He’s set up to fail.’ But it’s the Lakers,” said Geno.
Los Angeles’ interest in hiring Hurley took the NBA by storm, as many insiders never expected anything like this.
The news is shocking, yes. One of the most successful franchises in league history is considering giving a job to someone who has never coached in the NBA before? Well, it wouldn’t be the first time, as Darvin Ham also started coaching on the purple and gold bench.
Inside Zach Lowe was one who could not fathom this possibility. “The way they’ve reacted in the league in the last 48 hours…and this includes like the coaching agents I’ve talked to who have been on the edge of this process with their clients has been, ‘What?’ Like, people didn’t hear about this whispering. I didn’t hear a whisper about this,” he said on Saturday The Lowe Post.
While talking about the potential opportunity given to Hurley, Lowe explained how the Lakers team will benefit from the coach’s offensive mindset. However, he still believes that the strategist has not yet adapted to the reality of the NBA, but only of college basketball.
“There is no doubt about Dan Hurley’s genius at any level. The preparation of the game, the creativity of the big pictures, the wisdom of philosophy,” explained the expert. “It’s just a question of what you and I have to say about his fitness — to slow it down to match the rhythm of the NBA and the speed of an 82-game schedule.”
