Bob Hurley Sr. may have retired from coaching after his beloved St. Anthony’s of Jersey City closed its doors last June.
But his sons Bobby and Danny are making sure his Hall of Fame legacy stays alive as head coaches at Arizona State and Rhode Island. I could tell Bob Hurley Jr. had some of his father’s teaching skills when he was an assistant to Danny at Wagner and later as a head coach for a year at Buffalo. But I had no idea he would resurrect the Sun Devils in just his third season.
Hurley made national news Sunday when his 16th-ranked Arizona State Sun Devils increased their record to 9-0 with an impressive 95-85 victory over second-ranked Kansas at Allen Field House in Lawrence.
“Nobody really wins here,” Hurley said. ‘You come in here, most of the time you’re not leaving real happy.”
This is the seventh time in nine games Arizona State has scored at least 90 points. Hurley got a combined 72 points from his three guards, Senior Trae Holder scored a game high 29 points while Shannon Evans contributed 22 and Remy Martin came off the bench to add 21.
“I didn’t have to coach them a lot tonight,” Hurley said. “These guys deserve all the credit with their shot-making ability, the energy they played with on both ends of the floor, the deflections they got all over the court . . . they did a lot of great things.”
Maybe we should have seen this coming when the Sun Devils beat up on Xavier Nov. 24. We should see it tomorrow with Arizona State cracks the Top 10 and Hurley, a one-time All America guard who played on two national championship teams at Duke in 1991-92, pops up as a possible successor for Mike Krzyzewski when Coach K eventually retires at Duke.
Arizona State got off to a slow start, falling behind by 13 points early in game. But once the Devils caught their breath, they outscored Kansas, 58-42, in the second half, chewing up the Jayhawks’ defense and sucking the energy out of Allen Field House.
