Danny Hurley in preseason college basketball poll: ‘Nothing is useless’

UConn is ranked No. 4 in the preseason Associated Press Top 25 college basketball poll, but that isn’t impressing Huskies coach Dan Hurley.

“There’s nothing more useless than preseason polls and picks,” Hurley said during Big East media day. “Preseason polls are pretty meaningless. I don’t even do mine. I think I told (assistant coach) Luke (Murray) to go do that s—.”

It’s a seemingly ironic statement from a coach who just last season said, “We dominate for the national championship, we lose all the players, and then we’re even better. We dominate even more, we lose all the players … I think we should’ve been voted first. I don’t understand how we don’t just start the season there [at No. 1]”.

Hurley seems to have learned from that comment. Last season, UConn was ranked No. 3 in the preseason poll. The Huskies wound up finishing the year 24-11 – third place in the conference and an eighth seed in the NCAA Tournament.

This season, UConn will try to get back into the national title conversation. Despite Liam McNeely leaving for the NBA and Hassan Diarra and Samson Johnson graduating, the Huskies have the highest preseason ranking among Big East teams. They bring back a handful of notable players, including Alex Karapan, Solomon Paul, Tarris Reed JrJaylen Stewart and Jayden Ross. They also added a pair of dynamic guards in the transfer portal – Silas DeMarre (Georgia) and Malachi Smith (Dayton).

Hurley also told reporters that while he has high regard for this group of Huskies, he is “more focused on fixing their defense” rather than worrying about preseason rankings.

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