By Aidan Joly
It’s now been a few weeks since UConn coach Dan Hurley turned down a lucrative offer to leave Storrs for the glitz and glamor of the Los Angeles Lakers.
Plenty of top college basketball coaches have been lured to the NBA over the years. The most recent was John Beilein, who left Michigan for the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2019. Beilein didn’t even last a full season before he stepped down, proving how tough it is.
Billy Donovan took Florida to back-to-back national titles in 2006 and 2007 and then left for the NBA in 2015, but has only advanced past the first round of the playoffs once in nine seasons. Fred Hoiberg had a failed stint with the Chicago Bulls after leaving Iowa State.
Some have had success though, most notably Brad Stevens, who left Butler to coach the Boston Celtics in 2013, and finally got his elusive title earlier this week after a successful stint as coach got him promoted to president of basketball operations.
Despite the mixed track record, NBA executives will surely look at successful college coaches in years to come. Who is most likely to make that jump?
Dan Hurley, UConn
Hurley is the reason this list even exists and despite him turning down the Lakers, he remains at the top of the list.
It’s tough to see him remaining in college basketball for the rest of his career. He has stated his desire to coach in the NBA several times in recent years. In this situation, it felt like he was picking his current situation at UConn over the situation the Lakers were in, not necessarily college basketball over the NBA.
Hypothetically, the next NBA franchise to pursue him, maybe in as little as year from now, could make more sense geographically, be in a better situation, and provide more money.
The pull to the NBA could be stronger next time around.
Micah Shrewsberry, Notre Dame
Shrewsberry has one of the best reputations as an Xs and Os coach in the country. It’s clear he has NBA coach potential.
Sure, he sports a 50-51 record in three years as a college basketball coach, but that should be looked past. To start, he has NBA pedigree, working as an assistant under Brad Stevens in Boston from 2013 to 2019 and was part of five playoff appearances in that time.
He devised an NBA-level system for Penn State in 2022-23, a system that got the Nittany Lions to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2011. In his first year at Notre Dame, he took a team that won 11 games in 2022-23, the 2023-24 team started out slow, but was playing its basketball at the end of the season. Notre Dame is well-positioned to fight for a tournament bid in 2025.
Once he gets Notre Dame to the dance, the calls are sure to start coming.
Kevin Young, BYU
Young has yet to coach a single game in college basketball, but he is already on this list for obvious reasons.
He came to BYU from being an assistant for the Phoenix Suns and was regarded as one of the top assistants in the league and a future head coach. Young almost got the Brooklyn Nets job before the job ended up going to Jordi Fernandez in this current cycle. He has nearly a decade of NBA experience on his resume as an assistant coach and has also served as the head coach of three different G-League franchises.
Young has impressed on the recruiting trail since getting the BYU gig, and it is surely possible the NBA teams will start calling again in short order, given that Young wins games with the Cougars.
Nate Oats, Alabama
Oats has never coached at the NBA level, but he could certainly be a candidate to move up to the pros.
He has built Alabama into one of the most elite offenses in college basketball year in and year out with his system that is similar to a pro-style, emphasizing points in and paint and three pointers, with not much middle ground.
It has worked wonders, climaxing with Alabama getting to the Final Four for the first time in program history this past season.
Oats also has a good track record of player development, with two first-round picks in the 2023 draft in Brandon Miller (No. 2 overall) and Noah Clowney (No. 23 overall). His hefty buyout does make things preventative – $18 million if he leaves in the next two teams according to CBS Sports – but it wouldn’t be surprising if NBA teams begin noticing Oats.
Eric Musselman, USC
The only coach on this list with actual NBA head coaching experience. Prior to moving down to college basketball in 2012, Musselman had a two-year stint as head coach of the Golden State Warriors from 2002 to 2004 and then one year with the Sacramento Kings in 2006-07.
Musselman has had successful head coaching stops at Nevada and Arkansas, USC is now his third head coaching gig since 2019 and his fifth school since 2014, making him something of a nomad in the coaching ranks. He is brash and outspoken, which has worn on some that he’s worked with.
Some of Musselman’s best teams over the years have run NBA-like offenses that are up-tempo and have NBA-level space and he does a good job at utilizing his talent to fit a system.
The jury is still probably still out on him being an NBA coach (he’s 108-138 in the NBA). But if he can flip USC from a middling Pac-12 team to a contender in the Big Ten, it’s certainly possible that he could make the move back to the NBA.
AJ Hoops 