Dan Hurley will send various clips he’s seen online into the UConn men’s basketball team’s group chat for motivation, or whatever he feels like should be shared with his players.
Lately, several of the videos have come from the Indiana football program and Heisman-winning quarterback Fernando Mendoza, who has gone viral a number of times for his candid humility and insight during the Hoosiers’ unlikely run to the College Football Playoff national championship.
“I’ve sent in clips of the quarterback in the post-game interviews, just the polish, the messaging, the importance of the spirituality and the way he leads as a quarterback,” Hurley said on a call Monday to preview the Huskies’ top-25 matchup at Seton Hall. “I admire football coaches and players a lot because I think it’s just the ultimate team sport and I think that players accept coaching in football a lot better than they accept coaching in basketball. It’s just part of the culture.”
Indiana coach Curt Cignetti, who has led the Hoosiers’ program from historically bad to undefeated and the No. 1 seed, competing for its first-ever national championship in just two years at the helm, has been known for his stoic sideline demeanor and hilarious one-liners. In his introductory press conference before leading Indiana to the CFP in Year One as head coach last season, Cignetti had the famous quote: “I win. Google me.”
Behind exceptional play from Mendoza and its dominant defense, Indiana has outscored Alabama and Oregon 94-25 in two playoff games.
Cignetti’s brash, confident demeanor isn’t much different from the Huskies’ head coach’s.
“I’ve got a lot of respect for him, for his relentlessness and his pursuit of excellence and how hard he must drive people around him to get that level of performance, just what he must bring to that facility on a daily basis to drive that level of execution,” Hurley said.
Going into the Seton Hall game at 16-1, Hurley hasn’t been too thrilled with the way his team has carried itself over the last few showings. UConn proved itself as a legitimate championship contender through the nonconference schedule and boasts one of the best resumes in the sport. But with his team still looking for the killer instinct that the back-to-back title-winning squads had to put games away late, there is room to grow.
Seton Hall, which entered the AP rankings this week at No. 25 after getting off to a 14-2 start, has turned things around from last year’s 2-18 finish in Big East play based largely on a relentless will to win. Hurley would like his team to look that way, too.
No. 3 UConn men look to end losing streak at Seton Hall in top-25 showdown: How to watch
“Our season’s gone real nice. We’ve won a bunch of games in a row, we’re ranked high, we’re going for 17-1 (on Tuesday), but what we’re not doing is playing as hard as we need to play. And we see that on film,” Hurley said. “For us, things have gone so sweet that these last couple games, we haven’t looked the way one of my teams should look. … We don’t play hard enough. We don’t play as hard as we should play. I don’t know if that is human nature and overconfidence, or what-have-you … If you play top-10 offense, top-10 defense, if you’re a better rebounding team and you play harder than your opponent every night, you’re not gonna lose very often. That’s what I’ve got to get out of this group and it’s just not happening right now.”
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