The Lakers are reportedly targeting UConn men’s basketball coach Dan Hurley for their head coaching vacancy.
Hurley, who has won back-to-back men’s NCAA national championships at the helm of the Huskies, has had preliminary contact with the Lakers and both parties are “planning to escalate discussions in the coming days”, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski first reported early Thursday morning, citing unnamed sources.
The report added that the Lakers are “preparing a massive, long-term contract offer” to Hurley, who has reportedly been at the forefront of the franchise’s search from the start of the process.
“The Lakers over the next few days, are in a full-court press to convince Dan Hurley to come to L.A.,” Wojnarowski said on ESPN radio. “He’s told them that he wants to hear them out.”
Fox Sports’ John Fanta, citing unnamed sources, reported that Hurley told his players Thursday morning that he’s been in talks with the Lakers, with the sentiment from Hurley being that “it’s business as usual for now.”
The external expectations were that former NBA player and current broadcaster JJ Redick would be the Lakers’ next head coach, with The Athletic’s Shams Charania reporting Tuesday that the Lakers were “zeroing in” on Redick as the frontrunner to be the team’s next coach.
But the Lakers appear to be motivated and focused on bringing in one of the most successful college basketball coaches of the modern era.
Since the beginning of their search, which started after they fired Darvin Ham on May 3, the Lakers have reportedly had long-term goals with this coaching hire. The Lakers have had six full-time head coaches since the departure of Phil Jackson in 2011, with all of them being at the helm of the team for at most three seasons.
With Hurley, the son of legendary high school basketball coach and Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Famer Dan Hurley Sr., the Lakers are hoping they can secure someone known for his coaching acumen while also having a track record of being a program builder with a high-level player development system.
“The Lakers, [General Manager] Rob Pelinka, they want to put a program in place in L.A.,” Wojnarowski said. “They don’t want to just have coach to coach. They want to put a program in for the long term. They want Dan Hurley’s player development program.
“The NBA’s changing. You can’t in L.A. anymore just trade three or four first-round picks to bring in a star player and think you can have a roster that can win. You are seeing you have to draft well, you have to develop your young players. In L.A., the belief is always you’re going to be able to get the star player who finds his way to L.A. But you’re going to have to grow your young players.”
Wojnarowski added: “The idea of Bronny James [son of Lakers star LeBron James] and the Lakers, they have the 55th pick [in the June 26-27 NBA draft]. Who better than Dan Hurley to be the development coach to lead his growth than the coach who’s really dominated the college sport?
“You talk about X’s-and-O’s acumen, player development, there’s been more than one NBA coach who’s said to me in recent months, even as they’re watching tape on UConn for [potential draft lottery picks center] Donovan Clingan or [guard] Stephon Castle or others, they talk about the sophistication of UConn’s offense. I’ve had more than one coach say, ‘This would really translate to our league.’ Certainly, Rob Pelinka has recognized that. From Day One of this Lakers’ search, it has been Dan Hurley.”
Hurley, 51, hasn’t coached at the NBA level.
He turned down reported interest from Kentucky after the departure of John Calipari earlier in the spring. But after winning his second national championship with UConn in April, Hurley expressed interest in coaching at the NBA level while also saying he doesn’t want to coach college basketball anywhere else.
Hurley signed a six-year, $32.1 million contract extension with the Huskies last summer that runs through the 2028-29 season after UConn won the 2023 NCAA men’s title.
As part of the buyout language in his contract with the Huskies, Hurley would owe UConn $1.87 million if he goes to an NBA team before March 31, 2025, according to Sportico – which the Lakers would be expected to handle if they hire Hurley. If Hurley left the Huskies for another college job, he would owe UConn $7.5 million.
“Maybe down the road, you hope you can mature enough emotionally to, much later in my career, to try to take a shot at the NBA,” Hurley said after UConn’s championship parade April 13. “The road, way down the road. I’m not going to coach anywhere else in college.”
Hurley reaffirmed his desire to coach in the NBA during an appearance on “The Mike Francesa Podcast” earlier in the week.
“I do aspire one day, if the right NBA situation were to come along, I do aspire to really testing myself,” Hurley said. “If the right situation where an organization wants a tone setter to come in and instill a culture with young players and an organization that wants to pursue championships.”
Hurley, who played at Seton Hall from 1991-96, started his coaching career in 1996-97 as an assistant on his dad’s St. Anthony High (Jersey City, N.J.) staff before moving to the college level as an assistant coach with Rutgers from 1997-2001.
He first became a head coach when he was at the helm of Saint Benedict’s Preparatory School (Newark, N.J.) from 2001–2010, where Hurley built the program into a national prep school powerhouse, having a 223-21 record in nine seasons.
Hurley was the head coach at Wagner College for two years (2010-2012), where he set the school single-season win-loss record at 25-6 during the 2011-2012 season before becoming the head coach at the University of Rhode Island for six years (2012-2018).
He led the Rams to back-to-back NCAA Tournament appearances in 2017 and ’18, their first appearances since 1999. Rhode Island went 113-82 under Hurley, including back-to-back 25-plus win seasons, winning the 2017 Atlantic 10 Tournament and being the 2018 A-10 regular-season champions.
UConn has gone 141-58 with Hurley since 2018, including winning the Big East’s regular-season and tournament championships and the NCAA Tournament in 2023 and ’24.
Hurley’s Huskies, Billy Donovan’s Florida Gators (2006-07) and Mike Krzyzewski’s Duke Blue Devils (1991-92) are the lone programs to win back-to-back men’s national championships in the past 50 years. UConn has the chance to become the first program since UCLA to three-peat when Coach John Wooden’s Bruins won seven consecutive national titles from 1967-73.
The Lakers tried to hire Krzyzewski in 2004, but the legendary college coach decided to stay with the Blue Devils. Krzyzewski, who retired after the 2021-22 season, has been an “unofficial resource” for the Lakers during this coaching search, according to The Athletic.
Krzyzewski and Hurley know each other well.
Hurley’s older brother, current Arizona State coach Bobby Hurley, played at Duke under Krzyzewski from 1989-93. Dan Hurley has known Krzyzewski his “whole life,” according to CT Insider in a story that mentioned Krzyzewski telling Hurley that he ran his course at Rhode Island and encouraged him to take a more high-profile coaching job.
Hurley added that Krzyzewski is “somebody I’ll reach out to a couple [of] times a year and bounce some things off of, ideas about leadership or what have you.”
Krzyzewski also coached Redick at Duke from 2002-06.
Redick, who is a color commentator for ABC’s broadcast of the NBA Finals between the Boston Celtics and the Dallas Mavericks, addressed the rumors of him being the Lakers’ next coach during a Wednesday appearance on “GoJo and Golic”.
“My focus right now is on calling the NBA Finals,” Redick said. “I’m so fortunate that I’m in this position and I get to call these Finals with Doris [Burke] and Mike [Breen]. My day-to-day right now is consumed with calling games, the 19 different podcasts I feel like I have. My obligations to all of our partners. My focus is on the NBA Finals. In terms of Shams’ [report], that will be addressed once the season is over. I’ll just say that.”
Hurley is the reigning Naismith Coach of the Year.
The Lakers have reportedly interviewed several candidates, including Redick, New Orleans assistant James Borrego, Denver assistant David Adelman and Minnesota assistant Micah Nori.
The organization plans to make Lakers star big man Anthony Davis a “significant part of the conversation on the next head coach and wants to make sure that he’s aligned with how a new coach plans to feature him,” ESPN reported.
LeBron James, who has a June 29 deadline to exercise his $51.4 million player option for the 2024-25 season, appears to be fond of Hurley.
After Hurley appeared on Redick’s podcast, “The Old Man and the Three,” in mid-April after winning the NCAA title and discussing some of his offensive concepts, James posted a reply to Redick on X (formerly known as Twitter), “He’s so DAMN GOOD!!! Along with his staff. Super creative with their O! Love it.”
