Dan Hurley on His Outlook for Season Two

MYSTIC, Conn. – Dan Hurley put down his foundation for the UConn basketball program last season, now he’s ready to start building on it.

The second-year head coach spoke with the media before Tuesday night’s UConn Coaches Road Show stop at Latitude 41 in Mystic.

“It’s just that you have more people that know what you expect, more people just involved with the program overall," said Hurley, who was joined at the event by football coach Randy Edsall and women’s basketball coach Geno Auriemma.

“Both players and staff, they understand my expectations and understand the way we want to do things. Everyone throws around the culture word, but the culture I want to instill I think has been established now, and obviously, we’re adding talent...

“Everything is moving forward nicely.”

The Huskies had a roller-coaster first season under Hurley, finishing ninth in the American Athletic Conference at 6-12 with a 16-17 overall.

They lose guard Jalen Adams, but the majority of the cast is back, starting with senior guard Christian Vital and redshirt junior point guard Alterique Gilbert in the backcourt.

“I just think he grew a lot during the year,” Hurley said of Vital. “Up until Jalen and Al kind of went down around the same time, Christian’s numbers were super-efficient on offense.

“He was playing really good ball and he was shooting much better percentages from the field,” Hurley added. “I think he was having a good year and I think he’s matured."

There were rumblings Vital may be leaving the program, but he announced his return earlier this offseason.

“We had some good talks I thought after the season," Hurley said. "We met a couple times because you got to get on the same page.”

UConn almost got a full season out of Gilbert, and his return at the point will be huge. After hardly taking the floor his first two seasons due to shoulder problems, Gilbert (12.1 points, 3.6 assists) played in 25 games before suffering a season-ending eye injury that kept him out of the conference tournament.

“Al’s healthy and Al will be back [later this summer],” Hurley said. “Obviously, a tough way for the season to end but the message to Al was ‘you made a big improvement this year, you almost played out the whole season after struggling to get through much of it.’

“For us, kind of our motto here, you have to continue to develop the young players but the thing we keep preaching is big jump.”

Three players in particular that the Huskies hope can take that large leap are Gilbert, junior center Josh Carlton and junior forward Tyler Polley.

Carlton shared the most improved player in the AAC last season after averaging 8.1 points and 5.5 rebounds in 33 games.

“Josh improved a lot, made a jump, but we need a bigger jump from him,” Hurley said. “Tyler showed improvement but we need a bigger jump. … My challenge to Al is you know what it is now, you went through a season, you know get back to being Al and be one of the best point guards in the country.

“That’s got to be the standard that you set.”

Carlton shared the most improved player in the AAC last season after averaging 8.1 points and 5.5 rebounds in 33 games.

“Josh improved a lot, made a jump, but we need a bigger jump from him,” Hurley said. “Tyler showed improvement but we need a bigger jump. … My challenge to Al is you know what it is now, you went through a season, you know get back to being Al and be one of the best point guards in the country.

“That’s got to be the standard that you set.”

UConn’s 2019 recruiting haul – which still might not be done – adds some juice to the lineup with four-star forward Akok Akok, who has been on-board since January, along with guards James Bouknight (ranked 76th) and Jalen Gaffney (131st). Akok was a top-30 recruit for 2019 before reclassifying.

Howard guard R.J. Cole is another newcomer, but will sit out a season as a transfer. Cole’s addition puts the Huskies at max 12 scholarships – they gave up one for the 2019-20 season as a preemptive punishment for NCAA violations.

“In this game now, I don’t think your roster is ever set,” Hurley said. “We are still talking about what our ’19 options would be if we were to have a scholarship, what direction do you go?

“Do you look for a backup big that can compete with Isaiah (Whaley) for minutes in the front court, maybe play a little bit of ‘4,’? … Or do you continue to try to find players that are in two to three years can lead you to where you want to be, which is at a much higher level than we are now.”

UConn has been courting 6-foot-4 guard Demarr Langford, who ranks 69th in the Class of 2020, but could reclassify to 2019 this summer.

Langford said last month that UConn, West Virginia and Pittsburgh were still interested for next season, but that he would wait until after his AAU season with Mass Rivals to decide.

Hurley and his staff have a break in the action at this point in the calendar, but there is still plenty to do. He mentioned the Huskies still are one or two games away from having their schedule set for next season.

“This is probably the first time that the majority of players aren’t on campus, so you are kind of dealing with the kind of things you do at this time of the year,” Hurley said. “Summer calendar for what we are trying to do when they get back on campus in terms of workouts – we obviously have to keep getting better that way.

“Obviously a lot of recruiting planning and just program building, keeping it moving forward.”