Dan Hurley says ‘there’s probably a number’ the Lakers could have offered

The Lakers offered Connecticut coach Dan Hurley a significant amount of money – $70 million over six years – to become their head coach.

He turned them down to return to UConn and try to coach the Huskies to a third straight NCAA championship.

Is there an amount the Lakers could have offered Hurley that would have changed his mind?

“There probably is,” Hurley said Thursday on “The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz,” although he said he wasn’t sure what that amount would be.

Making his first public comments since turning down the Lakers’ offer on Monday, Hurley said that figure would have to have been extraordinary enough for him to leave his situation in Storrs, Connecticut, behind.

“To leave a place where you feel the same way we do and the family connection with my wife, my sons, my mother-in-law, my father – I know how much it means to my father to go to the Big East tournament and going to 10 UConn games a year at home and sitting on the field when I coach against Rick Pitino, you know? Hurley said.

“To leave all that behind, there’s probably a number. I do not know what it is.

Hurley, the son of legendary high school coach Bob Hurley Sr., was 141-58 in six seasons at Connecticut and 68-11 in the previous two seasons, both of which ended with tournament championships of the NCAA. In a whirlwind of events last week, Hurley emerged as the Lakers’ leading candidate to replace fired coach Darvin Ham and flew to meet with majority owner Jeanie Buss and executive vice president and general manager Rob Pelinka on Friday .

“After thinking about it earlier in the week, it was something I wanted to explore, you know, the opportunity to potentially coach the Lakers and coach one of the greatest players of all time (LeBron James) and coaching another of the best players in the NBA (Anthony Davis) and leading such a legendary franchise and walking the sidelines where some of the greatest of all time, Pat Riley and Phil Jackson. said Hurley. “It was something in my mind that I had to explore and consider and see what it looked like.”

Hurley told Le Batard that he struggled with the decision throughout the weekend, but set a deadline for himself to decide before bedtime on Sunday night, before a Connecticut team practice already scheduled for the next day.

“You have two incredible opportunities and it tears you up inside,” Hurley said. “From the moment we landed and started hanging out with Rob and Jeanie and spending time in the facilities and then knowing what you were going to leave at UConn and trying to imagine what it would be like to walk in in the locker room and telling your team, “I’m not with you guys anymore.”

“Because the beautiful thing that is still there for us at UConn, that NIL and the portal have not destroyed, is that we have a very beautiful connection here, still at the university, that there is a feeling of connection, of brotherhood. There are real emotions and feelings for each other here because of the way our program works which, ultimately, is probably a deciding factor. (It’s) your desire to continue to be a part of it without knowing that it’s necessarily something you could participate in in the professional ranks.

If he hadn’t set a deadline, Hurley said, “I would have agonized over this decision for a longer period of time because, you know, the chance to coach the Lakers and LeBron and AD and work for Jeanie Buss and working with Rob Pelinka was a hard thing to pass up.