2x NCAA Champion Dan Hurley Laughs Off Kentucky Job Rumors With a Nod to Wife Andrea: “She’ll Answer That”

Published 04/09/2024, 2:01 AM EDT

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USA Today via Reuters

Dan Hurley is on Cloud 9 as the UConn Huskies have won their second consecutive National Title. They comfortably beat the Purdue Boilermakers 75-60 on Monday, bringing the program its sixth Championship, tied for third all time. So would Hurley be interested in moving to the program with the second most titles ever? The Kentucky Wildcats head coaching position opened up for the first time in 15 years after John Calipari left for pastures new.

As per reports, Hurley tops Kentucky’s potential coaches checklist, and so many speculations have been hovering in the news circles that Hurley might leave. However, the 2x NCAA champion has no intention of moving away from the elite program that he has built at UConn. Let’s take a look at how he addressed these queries to the reporters.

Dan Hurley going smooth savage on this one

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In the post-game press conference, Hurley dismissed the speculations coming his way regarding the same by deflecting the question to his wife, Andrea. “Yeah, yeah, I don’t think that’s a concern (laughs). My wife, you should have her answer that. She’ll answer that question better than I can.”

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Hurley’s response came after the reporter quoted Hurley’s on-court statement related to UConn giving him all the resources he needed. More to the fact, Hurley will be getting a bonus of $1.8 million with UConn becoming the first school to win their second consecutive national title since Florida did so in 2006-07.

In addition, Dan Hurley will also collect a net, a ring, and a bonus of $500,000 for the Huskies taking over Purdue in the 2024 national title game. But that’s not all, Hurley could also reach his maximum contractual amount of $2 million if the team also performs well in academic aspects.

Now, coming back to the hovering rumors, both Hurley and the UConn staff are clearing the air on this hot one.

Dan Hurley and staff dissing the rumors

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After winning two back-to-back titles, Hurley is now in a unique position of being a coach who has won it all at UConn. Meanwhile, the Kentucky job also appears to be hot in the market. However, Hurley plans to keep things as they are. As reported by the Athletic, he says, “I don’t think that’s on my mind. No way. I can’t afford a divorce right now. I just started making money, “ indicating that doing so would put his marriage in jeopardy.

“The last thing I’m thinking about is another place. We’re in a position right now to be back-to-back in an era that makes it tough to do it. Now you’re thinking in your brain, as I look at that locker room, I’d like the chance to do it three times. A dynasty in modern times. That’s what I’m thinking about,” Hurley on being UConn’s head coach.

UConn’s athletic director David Benedict also has similar thoughts regarding the rumors when he said, “would do everything we can to remain in position to win championships.”

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Elaborating on the above statement, Benedict says, “The market is the market and Kentucky is obviously Kentucky, but last time I checked, we won the last two national championships and we’ve got six of them. So I think UConn is a pretty good job and Dan’s doing an unbelievable job.”

“We obviously hope that he’s with us for a long time. UConn has a tradition of keeping coaches that have reached Hall-of-Fame level success at UConn for a long period of time — coach (Jim) Calhoun, coach (Geno) Auriemma. I’m sure they had plenty of opportunities to leave and we certainly hope that Dan follows suit,” Benedict adds.

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Written by:

Dimple Gupta

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Dimple Gupta is an NBA writer at EssentiallySports. Dimple is adept at in-depth coverage and brings insightful coverage with her captive chronicles. Her articles often discuss trade details, NIL deals, and other monetary aspects.
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Edited by:

Pragya Vashisth