Dan Hurley’s one moment in time, once unimaginable, now finds him the face of college basketball

Dan Hurley cuts down net after UConn’s second straight national championship, solidifying Huskies’ dominant two-year run. (Photo by Jaden Daly/Daly Dose Of Hoops)

GLENDALE, Ariz. — Dan Hurley’s pregame and postgame playlists have become a topic of conversation in UConn’s NCAA Tournament run this past month, which begged the question of what the UConn coach’s musical selection would be Monday night after the Huskies clipped Purdue to win their second straight national championship.

His answer?

“One Moment In Time,” he deadpanned, surprising some of the media gathered outside the UConn locker room by choosing a track by the late great Whitney Houston.

“The words are very fitting in that song,” he elaborated. “I know the men in here are like, ‘you’re listening to Whitney Houston?’ But it’s just a perfect song when you win a big game. The words move me.”

But upon closer examination, Houston’s powerful anthem — the theme song of the 1988 Summer Olympics — actually does fit the road Hurley has traveled through his 51 years to now become the consensus best coach in the game.

Each day I live, I want to be, a day to give the best of me.

Hurley’s desire to be nothing less than the pinnacle of his profession is hereditary. What his son, Andrew, described as desperation is simply a relentless pursuit of perfection that was passed down to him by his father, Bob, the legendary coach at St. Anthony in Jersey City.

I’m only one, but not alone.

Although Dan Hurley has always been his own man, he has had several guardian angels over the years, starting with his older brother, Bobby, to whom comparisons were naturally and unfairly made as each tried to carve their own niche in a royal family of New Jersey hoops.

“I wouldn’t be here without my brother,” Dan reflected. “The stuff my brother instilled in me, he toughened me up, but then he loved me and supported me in an incredible way. And he’s done it my whole life, when things weren’t going great for me, before I met my wife, my brother was my biggest supporter. Always has been.”

My finest day is yet unknown.

In December of 1993, any concept of Dan Hurley becoming what he is now would have been among the vast outreaches of dreams. When he stepped away from his junior year at Seton Hall, basketball had chewed him up and spit him out until a coaching change from P.J. Carlesimo to the George Blaney rekindled the fire.

“I was done with basketball until Coach Blaney came,” Hurley admitted. “I would have been in a much better place for P.J., but Coach Blaney just showed me a lot of love. Back then, there weren’t a whole lot of holistic coaches. It was like, you saw them in practice from 3:00 to 6:00 and you didn’t see them again. He taught me that you could build great relationships, and you need to build great relationships with your players, and help them develop as people. I wouldn’t be in coaching. I was done with basketball if he didn’t come into my life.”

I broke my heart, fought every gain. To taste the sweet, I face the pain.

Three decades ago, such a trajectory was impossible. What would Danny, several weeks from turning 21 when he said he was through, see staring back at him in the mirror today?

“He wouldn’t recognize this,” present-day Dan said, his voice cracking just enough to show audible emotion. “Just the people along the way that have just helped me get here…my wife, obviously my two sons, and then Sister Catherine (Waters, a psychologist at Seton Hall with whom Hurley developed a bond with during his redshirt year) and Father Edwin Leahy at (St.) Benedict’s changed me so much at a critical time. It’s a great story, man. My whole path in coaching, doing it at the high school level and then low Division I, mid-Division I, really having to perfect my craft to take the next step. The journey, man, is the shit. It really is.”

I rise and fall, yet through it all, this much remains.

In March 2018, Hurley left Rhode Island, where he had spent six years restoring the prestige of one of the Atlantic 10’s flagship programs, to replace Kevin Ollie at UConn. But as he recalled Monday, life in Storrs was not sunshine and rainbows at its onset. So much so, in fact, that he voiced his displeasure to Jim Calhoun — then and now still an integral part of the program in retirement — only to, as the Hall of Fame coach put it, be “read the riot act.”

“You mean, he ripped my ass,” Hurley corrected the reporter who broached the Calhoun subject. “I had cold feet. I was trying to find a way to stay at Rhode Island. I was looking for an excuse to not go because I fell in love with Rhody, so I took the job and I had a little bit of buyer’s remorse because the first workout was a disaster. I couldn’t believe how bad it was in terms of just how everyone was playing, and everything was just not in great shape.”

“So at the end of day two, I went into (Calhoun’s) office and said, ‘hey Coach, this is bull you-know-what. Nothing’s in place. This is UConn, where’s the infrastructure, what’s been going on here, what the hell?’ And he was like, ‘are you shitting me? You’re not the person that we probably should have hired. If you ever come in here like this again…’ It was bad. He ripped me, and (assistant coach) Tom Moore was outside the office. I just flew out of there and I called (UConn athletic director) Dave Benedict and said, ‘we gotta get this shit fixed.’ That was a moment, though, because I called my agent before I went in there with Coach, and asked him if I could go back to Rhode Island. He explained the buyout thing to me and I was like, ‘okay, I guess I’m here.’”

I’ve lived to be the very best. I want it all, no time for less.

It took mere minutes for the buzz to subside before Hurley brought up the prospect of a three-peat, something that has not been done since John Wooden and UCLA won seven straight championships between 1967 and 1973. Hurley is not stopping himself from thinking big, and has a pair of counselors, so to speak, in Calhoun and Geno Auriemma to guide him along that route, with the latter having won four in a row within the past decade.

“I think Geno’s helped me iron out some of those rough edges, just in terms of how I handle things,” Hurley said of the legendary UConn women’s basketball coach. “And then Coach Calhoun, with how to build that championship mentality and what you’ve gotta instill in your team to be the best in March. Just to have those two people in my life at my disposal, most coaches don’t have that.”

“Some coaches, when they take jobs, they feel threatened or they’re insecure about wanting it to be their show. For me, I’ve always been smart enough to know that I’m gonna be a better coach next year if I use my resources. I’d be the biggest idiot in the world not to embrace (Calhoun), learn everything I can from him. He built this thing, he’s the patriarch. I wouldn’t be here doing this if it wasn’t for him.”

I’ve laid the plans, now lay the chance, here in my hands.

Hurley has a blueprint that will now be unquestioned for the duration of his coaching career, be it at UConn or anywhere else. Tom Moore, who served on his staff at Rhode Island for a year before returning to Storrs for a second stint at UConn, heralded his boss’ vision to return the Huskies to their place among college basketball’s elite, something that was reaffirmed on Monday.

“This is why I came here,” Hurley said. “I felt like everywhere I’ve ever been, year two winning 25 games at Wagner — which is tough to do — and what we did at Rhody the last couple years, I believe in the formula and I’m smart enough to put the very best people around me.”

Dan Hurley now has his one moment in time, where he is now more than he thought he could be three decades ago, when all of his dreams are a heartbeat away, the answers all up to him. Given to him, he has raced with destiny the past two years, and taken the checkered flag alongside it.

“We’re exactly where I thought we’d be,” he declared. “Did I know we were gonna repeat and do it in this type of fashion? Probably not, but I believed we would be at the top of the sport, where we are right now.”

And now, in that one moment in time, he and those around him — players, coaches, family, and fans — feel one collective emotion, in one collective state:

Eternity.