Will college football and men's basketball lose their national champion coaches to the pros in the same year?
Jim Harbaugh led Michigan to a 15-0 record and a College Football Playoff championship before leaving to become coach of the Los Angeles Chargers on Jan. 24. Dan Hurley led UConn to back-to-back NCAA men's basketball championships the last two seasons. Now, ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski reports the Los Angeles Lakers are targeting Hurley to become their next head coach.
Harbaugh's departure – combined with Alabama coach Nick Saban's retirement – means there are three active FBS coaches with national championships. Georgia's Kirby Smart and Clemson's Dabo Swinney are the only ones who won a national title at their current school. North Carolina coach Mack Brown won a national title with Texas in 2005.
If Hurley leaves, there would be six active coaches with national championships. Michigan State's Tom Izzo, Kansas' Bill Self, Baylor's Scott Drew and Virginia's Tony Bennett are at their current schools. St. John's coach Rick Pitino won national titles at Kentucky and Louisville, the latter which was vacated by the NCAA. First-year Arkansas coach John Calipari won a national title at Kentucky.
Is that dwindling number an indictment of the landscape of the two major revenue men's college sports?
Before answering that question, you have to compare the Harbaugh and Hurley situations and the challenges they would face at the next level.
Dan Hurley, Jim Harbaugh coaching comparisons
Harbaugh and Hurley both have strong family coaching histories.
Dan's father Bob won 26 state championships at St. Anthony High School in Jersey City, N.J. Dan's brother Bobby won two national championships as a point guard for Duke and will enter his 10th season at Arizona State. Dan Hurley was a point guard at Seton Hall and started his coaching career as an assistant at St. Anthony.
Jim Harbaugh's father Jack was a longtime college assistant at Michigan before becoming a head coach at Western Michigan and Western Kentucky. He led the Hilltoppers to a I-AA national title in 2002. Jim's brother John won the brothers' head-to-head Super Bowl 47 matchup. Jim played quarterback in the NFL for 14 seasons before launching a coaching career.
Hurley and Harbaugh have both had ups-and-downs in their coaching careers, but both coaches were at their best this season.
Michigan finished with a 40-3 record the last three years, and Harbaugh led the Wolverines to three consecutive Big Ten championships, CFP appearances and the program's first national title since 1997. UConn is 68-11 the last two seasons, and they have dominated the NCAA tournament with two remarkable national championship runs.
Harbaugh and Hurley are known for their unique coaching style, combative behavior and unpredictable press conferences — and both beat Alabama in the national semifinals in their respective sports last season.
Why would Hurley leave a chance for a three-peat?
Why would Dan Hurley leave UConn?
According to ESPN, the Lakers are “preparing a massive, long-term contract offer” for Hurley to become the next coach, which would be a swift U-turn from the reports that NBA analyst J.J. Redick was a potential candidate.
Hurley is known for his offensive sets. SN's Steph Noh writes: "No other coach incorporates as much movement into their offenses. His sets are complicated and more precise than a Swiss watch, leading to great shots for his team."
This kind of move would not be unprecedented. Rick Pitino left Kentucky for the Boston Celtics in 1998. Billy Donovan left Florida for Oklahoma City in 2015.
MORE: History of college coaches heading to the NBA
Why did Jim Harbaugh leave Michigan?
Harbaugh served two three-game suspensions at Michigan last season. The first was a school-imposed suspension from a NCAA case involving impermissible content with recruits during COVID-19. The second was a Big Ten suspension in connection with an NCAA in-person scouting investigation involving staffer Connor Stalions, who was fired.
Harbaugh returned and led Michigan to a national championship, but instead of taking a contract extension he returned to the NFL with the Los Angeles Chargers ahead of the 2024 season.
Would Dan Hurley joining Jim Harbaugh in the pros be an indictment on college sports?
That is the immediate concern with reports about Hurley and the Lakers.
Jim Harbaugh and Danny Hurley -- fresh off national titles -- jetting to the pros within months of each other is a sad commentary on the state of college athletics.
— Paul Hembekides (Hembo) (@PaulHembo) June 6, 2024
This discussion generally brings up NIL and the transfer portal with the next sentence, and there is probably some truth to it in certain cases. Alabama coach Nick Saban voiced concerns with both before retiring on Jan. 10, but he was also 72 years old.
Harbaugh is a different case. He coached with the San Francisco 49ers from 2011-14, took an interview with the Minnesota Vikings in 2022 and had been open about chasing a Super Bowl championship. Saban, Pete Carroll and Urban Meyer are other national championship coaches this century who coached in the NFL, and Butch Davis was close to a national title at Miami in 2000 before leaving for the Cleveland Browns.
Georgia coach Kirby Smart signed a 10-year, $130 million contract on May 2. As long as elite college football coaches are paid that much, there will not be a shortage. Plus, are free agency and mega-contracts that much different from the pros?
Hurley is on a six-year, $32.1 million contract. He is the seventh-highest paid coach in the game. NBA coaching salaries look more like college football coaching salaries, so that is part of the answer.
The other it's the Los Angeles Lakers – the NBA's glamour franchise – and possibly LeBron James – who has won four NBA championships. That is winning at the highest level. Donovan and Pitino tried. Mike Krzyzewski was among the coaches who passed on that opportunity. If Hurley leaves, then it would appear to be more of a shift in the college basketball rank. Krzyzewski, Roy Williams, Jim Boeheim and Jay Wright are among the national championship coaches who have retired in recent seasons.
This has less to do with NIL and the transfer portal and more about the money and allure of competing at the highest level. That is the real answer here. Given the coaching background of Harbaugh and Hurley, that should not be much of a surprise.
Will Dan Hurley or Jim Harbaugh win a championship in L.A.?
The Chargers have never won a Super Bowl, but Harbaugh is off to a good start. Los Angeles had a strong draft, and they have a franchise quarterback in Justin Herbert. The Chargers had four winning seasons the last seven years under Anthony Lynn and Brandon Staley.
They are in the AFC West with the Kansas City Chiefs and Patrick Mahomes II, but Harbaugh was 44-19-1 in the regular season and 5-3 in the playoffs with the 49ers. He has proven he can win at the NFL level, but that was more than 10 years ago. It's a new challenge, but Harbaugh will be given some room given the five-year deal that pays close to $16 million a year.
Hurley is a more interesting fit. The Lakers won 17 championships, with their last one coming in the 2019-20. That is always the expectation for the franchise, but they have a combined record of 165-163 the last four seasons. James' future – not to mention the future of Bronny James – are possible layers to Los Angeles' future and could make that challenge more difficult. Hurley would be Los Angeles' fifth coach since 2014.
Both coaches would face hurdles, but they can succeed at the next level.
