The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Hurley not too sentimental going up against Seton Hall
Dan Hurley played five years at Seton Hall. He scored over 1,000 points, met his future wife Andrea and many other important figures in his life, and still roots for the program from afar.
“It’s got a huge place in my heart ,” the UConn coach said. “My whole life was built off of my time there, and the man it made me into.”
But in these COVID-19 times, where the Huskies have had 10 games postponed or canceled and only 11 played so far, Hurley isn’t about to get all sentimental when the Pirates traipse into Gampel Pavilion on Saturday (noon, FOX).
“I think when I’m in the Prudential Center, that’s when it’ll click for me,” Hurley said, referring to the Pirates’ home building in Newark, N.J. “This year, it’s just an important game.”
Indeed, UConn (8-3, 5-3 Big East) is just looking for wins right now to improve its NCAA tournament resume. Seton Hall (10-8, 7-5) would be a good opportunity — a Quad 2 opponent that is much better than its record would indicate.
The Pirates are No. 48 in the NET rankings (five spots below UConn) and have played what Hurley termed a “brutal” schedule, marred by losses at Louisville and Rhode Island and against Oregon.
“Yeah, 10-8 doesn’t tell the story of how difficult a game and
how talented a team they are,” Hurley said. “They’re a really good team, man, that’s as good as anyone in the league and is an NCAA tournament team that can win games in the tournament.”
The Huskies will have a little extra help on Saturday. Freshman Andre Jackson, who’s missed the last six weeks with a broken wrist, will make his return. Jackson, a 6-foot-7 forward who was a national top-50 recruit, will likely play in short bursts as he eases his way back into action.
“But I’ve got to play him,” Hurley said.
The coach won’t be playing James Bouknight or Akok Akok. Bouknight, the team’s leading scorer, remains sidelined after undergoing elbow surgery on Jan. 12. Jon Rothstein of CBSSports.com reported on Friday that Bouknight could be a game-time decision for UConn’s game at Providence on Wednesday, but Hurley didn’t make such a prediction on a Zoom call later in the afternoon.
“They’re progressing, they’re getting closer to healthy,” he said of Bouknight and Akok, who’s missed the last three games with a shin injury. “Really not sure when we’ll have either guy. They’re both limited in practice right now.”
In truth, UConn isn’t only hunting for wins right now. It simply needs games. The Huskies haven’t played since Jan. 26, after a referee from that night’s win over Butler tested positive for COVID-19. UConn had to postpone games against No. 3 Villanova and red-hot St. John’s; Butler didn’t postpone any subsequent games.
“To pause that way is very, very strange,” Hurley noted. “We need games, man. We’ve had enough practices. We need games.”
He added that the Huskies are having conversations with the Big East about adding a “marquee” game — so long as it makes sense for the team’s busy remaining schedule.
“Obviously, it would make things incredibly tight for us, and would put us in a situation you would rarely see a college team in,” Hurley said. “To be honest, selfishly, to get a Quad-1 chance would be really nice for us. We present Quad 1s and Quad 2s for anyone in our league that we play. Obviously, we aspire to play in the NCAA tournament, so squeezing in a Quad 1 game would be appealing to us. We’ve just got to balance out player welfare and not run these guys into the ground.”
RIM RATTLINGS
Seton Hall coach Kevin Willard has been vocal about not necessarily welcoming UConn back into the Big East with open arms. Most recently, he told reporters: “Just because everybody gets a tax cut doesn’t mean it’s good for everybody.”
“Kevin feels the way he feels about UConn, and some other coaches feel that way,” Hurley said. “That’s fine.”
But the UConn coach noted that one of the reasons he left Wagner to coach at Rhode Island a decade ago was to play against tough teams like Butler, Xavier and Temple in the Atlantic-10.
“I’m a competitor. I want the best people in my league. I would be thrilled to have a big name, big brand program to come into my league, to raise the level of competition. I think that’s what most great competitors would want. I know it’s what I wanted in the Atlantic-10.”
He added: “I’ve got a lot of respect for the success Kevin’s had. But we would look at that differently.”
⏩ This won’t be the first time Hurley hass coached against his alma mater. He led URI to a 75-74 victory over the Pirates in the 2017 NIT Season Tipoff at Barclays Center in Brooklyn. Five years earlier, Seton Hall topped URI 60-55 in the Hall of Fame Tipoff Classic at Mohegan Sun Arena.
⏩ The last time UConn faced the Pirates was Feb. 10, 2013 at the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J. — a 78-67 Husky victory a day after a blizzard had blanketed the region.
⏩ Hurley noted that UConn has had only three COVID-19 cases, and two of them are approaching the end of the 90-day window in which they don’t need to be re-tested, per NCAA guidelines. Only one of 10 staff members has tested positive.
“Our guys have done an incredible job. We’ve been unlucky with it, in a number of ways.”