Dan Hurley was officially introduced as Connecticut's head basketball coach Friday after spending six seasons at Rhode Island.
He described the Huskies' position as something he'd always been working toward.
"The No. 1 reason (for choosing Connecticut) ... was that this was a dream job for me," Hurley said at his introductory press conference, according to the Providence Journal's Bill Koch. "People close to me knew this was a small list of schools I dreamed of coaching. This was the top of that list."
It will be a significant undertaking for the '90s Seton Hall point guard to bring the Huskies back to national relevance. The storied program failed to make the NCAA tournament in each of the last two seasons, and struggled to a 14-18 record (7-11 in conference play) in 2017.
Connecticut's new boss had similarly tall tasks coaching at Wagner and with the Rams, but believes it will be easier to turn this squad around.
"It's not the same rebuild of the last two (teams) that I've taken over," Hurley said. "At a place like this, with all the resources and the history, it can happen quickly."
Despite Hurley's dream to lead a top-flight basketball program, it was difficult to leave his previous school.
"The pain I knew it would cause to Rhode Island, the fans, the players, was something I was trying to avoid," he said. "(But) once I met with UConn, I think my family knew that we would eventually be here."
