Dan Hurley shares his life story and journey as successful coach and driven human being in his autobiography, Never Stop, available in bookstores now. (Photo by Simon & Schuster)
Beginning with his youth, where he waged a battle to merely live up to his family name with a Hall of Fame coach for a father and two-time national champion turned NBA lottery pick of an older brother, to his own career as a high school coach before climbing the collegiate ladder, Hurley has lived the fight on the front line, taking and defending arrows from numerous directions. But while some criticize the man whose current line of work has delivered two more national titles at UConn for his demonstrative nature, he is simply — and quite unapologetically — being himself the only way he has known how.
Hurley tackles the fine line between being a college coach at the highest level while also balancing his family life and his mental health in his new book, Never Stop: Life, Leadership, and What It Takes to Be Great, which released at the end of September and is currently available wherever books are sold. Along with bestselling author and well-known sportswriter Ian O’Connor, Hurley tells his story in his own unique style, taking readers through his journey in typical Hurley fashion, outlining the highs, lows and viral moments every step of the way. For those who know Hurley, you may find yourself reading this tale in his voice, while those who still find the coach misunderstood come away with a much clearer perspective of who he is at his core, a man who will stop at nothing to be the best while also bringing out the best in those entrusted to him.
Never Stop begins with Hurley recounting his trip to Los Angeles, where he, his wife Andrea, and sons Daniel and Andrew flew in the 2024 offseason to meet with the Los Angeles Lakers about their head coaching vacancy shortly after Hurley and UConn repeated as national champions, capping one of the most dominant seasons in college basketball history with a victory over Purdue. Hurley prefaces the private jet wining and dining by explaining his Jersey City, New Jersey roots as the impetus behind nearly all of his mannerisms and emotional displays, while noting that he was — in the initial setting of the book — “physically, spiritually, emotionally and geographically very fucking far from Jersey City.”
By now, most people know that Hurley and his wife mutually agreed that staying at UConn would be best as he rejected the Lakers’ six-year, $70 million offer, but he reveals within the book that his initial reaction was that he would accept and could see himself coaching the likes of LeBron James before his change of heart. After returning home and attending a Billy Joel concert at Madison Square Garden, Hurley shares that family friend Courtney Lynch, who also attended the concert, impacted his decision unknowingly by telling him, “you ain’t Hollywood, bro.”
From there, Hurley raises the curtain and relives his childhood in Jersey City, from the weekend morning runs his father Bob took him on before doing basketball drills in the park, conditioning routines that Dan called “mandatory marathons,” to the tough love that the elder Hurley exhibited to keep him and his brother Bobby out of trouble in an unforgiving town. Emerging from Bobby’s shadow, cast through an undefeated season and national championship in high school before winning two more titles as Mike Krzyzewski’s point guard at Duke, was hard for Dan to overcome, and as he recounts in the ensuing chapter, led to his falling out of love with basketball.
Hurley picked Seton Hall over Rutgers when deciding where to attend college, and intimated that being on his own, away from Jersey City for the first time in his life, eventually led to burnout and self-destruction. After receiving Bobby’s blessing to step away from basketball — Dan admits he did not have or could not find the courage to tell his father — he began the road to reclaiming his soul and loving himself through his counseling sessions with Sister Catherine Waters at Seton Hall, as well as his new head coach George Blaney, who had replaced P.J. Carlesimo following the latter’s departure for the NBA and the Portland Trail Blazers. As Dan discovered the concept of self-love, his inner reclamation coincided with his brother’s much-publicized car accident and subsequent comeback.
Following his graduation from Seton Hall, Hurley went on to meet Andrea, at that time still an undergraduate student, proposing to her after just five months as a couple and eventually raising their two sons together. He shares an epiphany in his declining an offer to play in Spain, deciding instead to go into coaching, where he began his career on staff with Kevin Bannon at Rutgers. After being fired several years later and seeing the less glamorous sides of recruiting, he decided to look into high school coaching, which led him to Father Ed Leahy and St. Benedict’s Prep, where he taught history and coached boys’ basketball, building his own culture in rapid fashion.
“Despite all that winning,” Hurley wrote, “it took three years before I really started to feel as though I actually knew what the hell I was doing as a coach.”
His turnaround and record caught the eye of Marist athletic director Tim Murray, who offered Hurley the Red Foxes’ head coaching job in 2008 after Matt Brady left for James Madison. Although he wanted the job, his wife was unwilling to move to Poughkeepsie, and Hurley ultimately declined the position. Two years later, his breakthrough came when Wagner hired him.
Dan, with Bobby as his lead assistant, turned the Seahawk program around in just two years before taking over at Rhode Island in a move that, at the time, he said he needed to take to step out of his comfort zone. While at Rhode Island, he credited Billy Donovan for introducing him to the meditation routines he practices to this day to disconnect him from the stress of his profession. Hurley also credits the conversation with Krzyzewski after Rhode Island fell to Duke in the 2018 NCAA Tournament as instrumental to the next step of his career, where Coach K told him he needed to take a job at a higher level. After a flirtation with the University of Pittsburgh, Hurley ultimately succeeded Kevin Ollie at UConn, but not before having second thoughts his second day on the job.
Hurley then takes readers through his tenure at UConn, beginning with the first four years and his now-famous “you better get us now” quote following a narrow loss at Villanova to building around Adama Sanogo, Jordan Hawkins and Andre Jackson following an agonizing early March exit to New Mexico State and masterfully crafting a back-to-back national champion.
Following the product that convinced him his team had the tools to dominate and play bulletproof basketball, Hurley does not shy away from last year, taking responsibility for his unraveling while UConn lost all three games in the Maui Invitational or his various confrontations with officials. When the Huskies’ run came to an end at the hands of eventual national champion Florida, Hurley admitted he considered resigning because he was “completely cooked” after losing control of his emotions at points and simply being burned out in general.
The conclusion to Never Stop is atypical, but in the world of Dan Hurley, apropos as the coach takes time to perform a self-inventory of sorts and reflect on why he does what he does and the complexities of coaching while also protecting his inner peace and mental health. In a profession where the latter is still stigmatized to a degree and not common, Hurley opens up to readers and is comfortable showcasing his vulnerability, hoping his players see the honesty and realness in him so that they are unashamed to be open with whatever they may fight on their own.
Unconventional, unequivocal, and unapologetic, Dan Hurley bares his soul in Never Stop, and turns a tale of success and determination into a gripping narration of wanting to improve yourself while remembering to not sacrifice the imperfections that make us who we are as people.
Never Stop: Life, Leadership, and What It Takes to Be Great
Authors: Dan Hurley and Ian O’Connor
Publisher: Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster
Publication Date: September 30, 2025
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.