Hurley's Heroes: UConn's Return to College Basketball's Elite

From rock bottom to national champions—this is the blueprint behind Dan Hurley’s UConn resurgence.

The UConn men’s basketball program had won three national championships in a span of fifteen years, its most recent just four years earlier. But by 2018, the program was in shambles. The Huskies had finished with a losing record in consecutive seasons for the first time in nearly forty years. It had suffered a string of embarrassing, blowout losses, a mass wave of transfers out of the program and, worst of all, was embroiled in scandal involving recruiting and other violations.

Enter Dan Hurley.

A former Big East player and member of one of basketball’s most famous families, Hurley had performed impressive renovation projects at his three previous stops, St. Benedict’s Prep, Wagner College, and the University of Rhode Island. Now, Hurley was hired to clean up the mess at UConn and return it to past glories. He had a plan, a blueprint: recruit high-character, high-level kids and by his fifth season, he had turned the Huskies into national champions, the program’s fifth title in twenty-four years.

How has Hurley done it? Dogged recruiting. Intense practices. An eleven-month season, with players on campus all summer. And most importantly, establishing a culture at UConn that transcends whatever talent is on the floor and makes his teams as “connected” as any in the country.

In Hurley’s Heroes, award-winning UConn beat writer David Borges tells the inside story of a driven coach and his team’s return to their rightful place among the NCAA’s elite.