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Dan Hurley is staying at UConn and declining the Los Angeles Lakers’ overtures to become their head coach, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.
The Lakers, who are seeking to replace Darvin Ham, made a serious push to hire Hurley after having been heavily linked with ESPN analyst JJ Redick. Wojnarowski reported they were prepared to pay the Huskies coach $70 million over six years.
Hurley, who met with Lakers general manager Rob Pelinka and team governor Jeanie Buss, told Woj on Sunday he had been “extremely impressed” by the franchise’s pitch.
Broadly, the grass has never been greener in terms of swapping the college ranks for the pros. Working in high-level college athletics was always a demanding year-round grind. The steady emergence of the transfer portal has only made the job tougher because of how much a roster can turn over in a given year.
Taking the Lakers job would’ve had some drawbacks, though.
Hurley’s decision could reflect how people within the industry actually view the Lakers.
Matt Norlander @MattNorlander
The Lakers’ ownership group is cash-strapped relative to other franchises. It’s got the glamour of Los Angeles and immense history, but multiple NBA sources have expressed caution over the difficulty of that job (with or without LeBron) and with the constraints of the new CBA.
The 51-year-old would be moving his family across the country with ultimately few assurances about his long-term future in Southern California. Since Phil Jackson retired in 2011, no coach has lasted more than three seasons on the sideline.
Whoever succeeds Ham will have to win now with a top-heavy roster built around LeBron James and Anthony Davis, two stars in their 30s who battled persistent injuries before staying healthy this past year. The organization has made one Western Conference Finals run after winning its most recent title in 2020.
Assuming you manage to keep the job long enough to pivot to a rebuild, you’re putting your faith in a front-office regime that hasn’t shown it can organically build a championship-caliber roster.
It’s also perhaps helpful to provide some context behind the Lakers’ reported offer. An $11.7 million annual salary isn’t an exceptional sum with the NBA coaching market ballooning.
According to Field of 68’s Jeff Goodman, Hurley is leaving some money on the table to remain in Storrs. UConn has tabled a six-year offer worth around $50 million.
Independent of the pros and cons behind coaching the Lakers, the pursuit of a third straight national championship presumably weighed heavily on his mind. The Huskies are set to lose Donovan Clingan, Stephon Castle and Tristen Newton, but there’s enough talent sticking around combined with the incoming recruits and transfers to think a three-peat is attainable.
