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INDIANAPOLIS – UConn coach Dan Hurley is a really easy guy to dislike.
His sideline antics are an embarrassment, berating refs and acting like a toddler having a tantrum. He’s crossed the line so many times it’s practically worn away, most recently with his bizarre interaction with a referee at the end of UConn’s stunning upset of Duke in the Elite Eight.
Hurley is the personification of everything that’s wrong with sports, his bad behavior enabled by his won-loss record.
And yet …
Take Hurley off the court, and he’s a completely different person. Personable, thoughtful, self-aware, even funny.
The kind of guy you want shaping the hearts and minds of young people because it’s obvious the life lessons he’s imparting matter just as much as the Xs and Os.
“I get much more of a bad reaction from people, I think, on social media than when I meet regular people,” Hurley said Friday, April 3 at the Final Four. “Because anytime I meet regular people, they look at me and they start laughing or they start smiling. Or (say), `You're the guy from the video. You look a little crazy, but I think you're a good egg.’”
Maybe it’s fitting that Hurley’s histrionics are a focal point as he tries to lead UConn to its third title in four years in what was once the backyard of Bob Knight, a coach who was called a lot of things in his Hall of Fame career, but never a good egg.
Whatever life lessons Knight taught were lost amid a hurricane of bad temper and chair tossing and, eventually, the choking of a player. Hurley isn’t that guy. He isn’t actually a jerk. He just plays one on TV.
“I think a lot of people kind of misinterpret who he is as a person,” UConn guard Silas Demary Jr. said. “Behind closed doors, he's one of the best coaches I've ever been around. He's going to feed you with confidence, but he's also not going to go over your head. He’s going to keep you even keeled. He's going to tell you when you do it bad. He's going to praise you when you’re doing good.
“The message is more important than the tone,” Demary added, “because at the end of the day, he's pushing us to be the best.”
That’s the end game, right? In eight years at UConn, Hurley has won almost 73% of his games and led the Huskies to back-to-back national titles in 2023 and 2024. He’s sent 10 players to the NBA from UConn, four of whom were lottery picks.
But the former high school coach knows that’s only part of his job. The Hurley his players see is approachable, someone they can have heart-to-heart talks with. He cracks jokes. He’s an advocate of therapy. He encourages them to put their phones down and live in the real world.
“Get off Twitter, get off Instagram, stop reading the comments. That's probably why it doesn't bother me when people have things to say,” Hurley said. “I don't live in that world. My world, and the world I think is the best world to live in, is the real world, which is interacting with people, putting your phone down.”
This isn’t meant to excuse Hurley’s outbursts. At 53, he’s old enough to know better. If he really wanted to change his behavior, he could. (Hurley himself noted he's not once gotten a technical during the NCAA Tournament.) Plenty of coaches are intense and passionate about the game without being the human equivalent of a Tasmanian devil.
Hurley also should consider himself lucky, because a coach of color would never be afforded the grace Hurley has been.
But the ultimate measure of a person, be they a college basketball coach, an insurance salesman or the president of the United States, is whether they are leaving the world a better or worse place.
On that call, there is little debate.
USA TODAY Sports' Jordan Mendoza contributed to this report.
Follow USA TODAY Sports columnist Nancy Armour on social media @nrarmour.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Dan Hurley's antics make him easy to dislike, but there's another Dan Hurley
