SI interview with Hurley

[Hans Sprungfeld]

I'm going to be the wet blanket here. Every coach in history after taking over a team says he will play more up-tempo. It's universal bologna.

Maybe Hurley really does mean it. Maybe he sees the UConn personnel is suited to it and it's the jolt necessary to get them to play more active and tougher.

But Hurley hasn't had a team in the top 150 (55th percentile or higher) in offensive tempo ever as a coach. He's had up-tempo defensive teams, for sure, but his offensive execution has been more... methodical and workman-like. Ollie's teams' offensive possession length was quite slow and on average ranked 226th in the country. While Hurley's over his 8 coaching seasons has been... 230th. Slower.

Defense is indeed a different story, as I mentioned he has had defensive teams that produced quite short defensive possession lengths and got after people, but even with that it never led to "get[ting] the ball down the court quickly". Nor were his offenses ever very effective when his teams played quick paced defense anyways: in the 4 years that qualify the highest his team's offense ranked in the country was 130th.

Now I can't decide whether I want the universal bologna wrapped in a wet blanket or tales of a crazy ex-girlfriend from a guy who's falling in love.

 

[nomar]

The Jalen stuff is the highlight for me. The rest all sounds good, but on a basic level what I really want to see is our coach getting the most, rather than the least, out of our players -- and the best place to start is with our best player. And props to Adams for listening to Hurley and accepting what Hurley was saying.

 

[CL82]

I thought it might be a joke, but then I considered the source (jk!). Sorry for my misread.

I'm not cranky presently; I am certainly capable of it, however.

I love all the positive things I'm reading and hearing about Hurley, the players and most of all the mindset. For me, however, it detracts from that positivity when people still constantly feel the need to insert Ollie into the discussion. I think it makes us look small, petty and insecure.

I'm also somewhat superstitious and want to remember that it's still the honeymoon period and the proof is in the pudding. I have faith that Hurley will deliver, but I don't want to jinx it.

I think it is pretty natural when posters hear players comments to think, what the heck was going on that the kids are responding so positively to a little straight talk. Frankly, I'm curious as well. I don't think it makes people look small, petty and insecure since it is a pretty typical reaction. I want to say get used to it until we start playing but I think that it will go through year end.

I'm taking all this stuff with a grain of salt. Hurley is making all the right noises, but we've seen that before. Still he seems like a great hire to me. I guess we'll see.

We're still doomed.

 

[HuskyHawk]

I'm going to be the wet blanket here. Every coach in history after taking over a team says he will play more up-tempo. It's universal bologna.

Maybe Hurley really does mean it. Maybe he sees the UConn personnel is suited to it and it's the jolt necessary to get them to play more active and tougher.

But Hurley hasn't had a team in the top 150 (55th percentile or higher) in offensive tempo ever as a coach. He's had up-tempo defensive teams, for sure, but his offensive execution has been more... methodical and workman-like. Ollie's teams' offensive possession length was quite slow and on average ranked 226th in the country. While Hurley's over his 8 coaching seasons has been... 230th. Slower.

Defense is indeed a different story, as I mentioned he has had defensive teams that produced quite short defensive possession lengths and got after people, but even with that it never led to "get[ting] the ball down the court quickly". Nor were his offenses ever very effective when his teams played quick paced defense anyways: in the 4 years that qualify the highest his team's offense ranked in the country was 130th.

I don’t think we will look like the showtime Lakers and run on made baskets. But, I’ll raise a few points that lead me to believe that he expects to run, and score off the defense.

1. We have depth, 10+ guys who,can play, and very few who stand out.
2. We lack 3 point shooters.
3. We don’t have any “feed the post” bigs

It’s obvious to me and I think to Hurley, that the best way for this roster to put up points is to play very aggressive defense and score in transition. A very limited Williams becomes a dangerous high flying finisher on the break. In the half court he’s a sack of potatoes. It’s like that for almost every player we have. Our scorers mostly like to attack the basket off the dribble. That is always more easily done when the defense isn’t set.

So I’m not suggesting that if he lands a dominant big man and a bunch of great shooters, he’ll keep playing that way. Rather that he will adapt to his personnel. This team needs to press and run. That was true even last year. We had fleeting moments when we did it.

 

[auror]

I don’t think we will look like the showtime Lakers and run on made baskets. But, I’ll raise a few points that lead me to believe that he expects to run, and score off the defense.

1. We have depth, 10+ guys who,can play, and very few who stand out.
2. We lack 3 point shooters.
3. We don’t have any “feed the post” bigs

It’s obvious to me and I think to Hurley, that the best way for this roster to put up points is to play very aggressive defense and score in transition. A very limited Williams becomes a dangerous high flying finisher on the break. In the half court he’s a sack of potatoes. It’s like that for almost every player we have. Our scorers mostly like to attack the basket off the dribble. That is always more easily done when the defense isn’t set.

So I’m not suggesting that if he lands a dominant big man and a bunch of great shooters, he’ll keep playing that way. Rather that he will adapt to his personnel. This team needs to press and run. That was true even last year. We had fleeting moments when we did it.

I'm in agreement with you that our personnel is best suited to that style.

It will be the first test of Hurley's coaching acumen if he is able to successfully get the team to do it. It goes against his and the current roster of players' track record. Definitely going to be the first thing I look for when the new season starts.

 

[B1GEast]

Jack Welch was right when he claimed that the best time to fire an employee is to never hire that person in the first place.

I think Hurley will turn out to be a great hire.

 

[jimva]

Bump