In 1989, Bobby Hurley walked onto the campus of Duke University as a wide-eyed 18-year-old who went on to exceed any imaginable expectation then-head coach Mike Krzyzewski and his staff had for him. Fast-forward to 2024, over 30 years after leaving the hardwood of Cameron Indoor Stadium, and Hurley presents himself as a foe, leading the Sun Devils to face off with the Blue Devils in their final preseason showdown on Sunday.
Starting 139 of 140 games in his collegiate career as a Blue Devil, Hurley was a college basketball spectacle. In his four-year career from 1989-93, he averaged 12.4 points per game and 7.7 assists, shooting over 40% from beyond the arch in a time when the average player was shooting roughly 33% from three. His 1,076 career assists (7.68 per game) still stand as the all-time NCAA record.
His statistics, though, fail to scratch the surface of his overall impact on the program. As the starting point guard, the Blue Devils went on to win back-to-back national championships in 1991-92. Hurley was named to the All-NCAA tournament team both years, along with earning the NCAA Tournament Most Outstanding Player in 1992. Following an incredible colligate career in Durham, Hurley’s found himself avoidant of his old stomping grounds as the recollection of his tenure is too precious to spoil.
“It's kind of a sacred place to me,” Hurley said Thursday. “I haven't always been great in life everywhere and that was like one place that was kind of special. I was so good there, and that's why I resisted wanting to go back; I just kind of wanted to leave it the way.
“It’s going to be mixed emotions; it's going to be a lot of fun. An opportunity to see Coach K on the weekend and treat this like a high-level road game and that's the primary focus, really. The other stuff is nice. I'll think about it, look up, and you know, see my jersey up there and maybe see a couple of those banners, but I hope hopefully that'll give me and the fellas some some inspiration.”
Hurley has a lot to be inspired about with the group of talent he will be coaching on Sunday, acquiring his most talented recruiting class in his 10-year span at ASU, reeling in the No.1 ranked center in the class of 2024 in Jayden Quaintance, along with the No. 8 ranked small forward Joson Sanon and 6-foot-9 forward Amier Ali. Hurley supplied himself with more than just the talented freshman; he also had a flurry of transfer talent from the portal.
Similarly, Duke has reloaded itself with an influx of elite talent. Freshman forward Cooper Flag is the consensus No.1 player in the class of 2024 who dominated the high school scene at Montroverde Academy this past season and sent fireworks to social media for his 6-9 frame and well-rounded skill set.
“Flag is deserving of all the things that people are saying about him,” Hurley said. “He's got a chance to be special, and more than that, though they have a new team, they're very much like us in a lot of ways with not as much retention. They had a high turnover and a high-level recruiting class.”
Duke certainly did its due diligence in the class of 2024. North Carolina native Isiah Evans, at 6-foot-6, is a silky scorer. The No.7 small forward in the class of 2024 is amongst the talented class. The other four freshmen on the Blue Devil roster sit at a combined height of 6-foot-8. With talented scoring wings and dominant inside big men, both of these rosters established themselves on the recruiting trail.
“Hype around them, it's real. They got real players,” Hurley noted. “My assistant coaches have briefed me about their first game and just what they looked like, so we have to be ready to play an elite team right away, and then I think it's a good gauge for just what you have to still do and where you are.”
This game will help dictate the remaining questions Hurley is still indecisive about, most of all configuring a rotation that will best suit his roster from top to bottom. With a diverse amount of talent that plugs different skill sets, the inquiry on starting lineups and minutes is long from being finalized.
ASU beat UC Irvine on the road in a closed-door scrimmage last week 70-65, where Quaintance, transfer guard Alton Mason Jr, and returning big man Shawn Phillips Jr were the standout performers. Despite the win, however, Hurley was not impressed by the way his team played and feels there is a lot of work to be done on both sides of the ball, particularly on defense, where they allowed too many uncontested driving lanes with minimal help side defense for Hurley's liking.
“ I have to make sure that we're getting better. We're still not there yet, and we just have to work on our execution at both ends of the floor,” Hurley admitted. “We really focused on breaking down the tape of our scrimmage over the weekend, and I mean, we didn't shoot great in the scrimmage, and our offense didn't function as well as I hoped it would. There were more issues defensively than I even realized in real-time when we broke it down so we had a lengthy film session so we're still like finding ourselves and I'm focusing on the errors and the mistakes that we're making and continuing us to get better.
“We struggled to rebound a little bit early in the scrimmage, gave up way too many middle drives, and had some breakdowns in ball screen defense. We either got rejected on the ball screen, or we didn't get the appropriate hedge on the ball screen. We also got no nail help. We say nail help one pass away was kind of non-existent, so whoever on the team we were playing was able to just kind of get paint touches. We gave up way too many points in the paint and paint touches overall, so we've worked on more resistance to keep the ball out of the lane, which has been kind of a focus of ours defensively this week.
“In our last scrimmage, I distributed the minutes at the end of the day. We were still trying to do what we had to do to win, so I think that'll always guide where your thoughts are in terms of rotation. So I'm going to try a different starting lineup than I did the first game, and I told the team that so we're still searching to find that the right combination and start getting guys prepared to get into the roles we hope that we see that they'll ultimately be in. I think as the game progresses you most likely you'll see the guys that are doing the best having the most opportunity to get more minutes.”
Working through the kinks, the Sun Devils are equipped with a playstyle and point of emphasis, in a new conference the Big 12 is referred to by many as the best conference in college basketball currently. With eight teams in the NCAA tournament in 2024, tied with the Southeastern Conference No.1, newcomers Arizona and Colorado, who also qualified for the Big Dance last season, make for a powerhouse of a league with difficult matchups every night. Hurley believes his team's identity to combat this new challenge will rely on getting out in transition and speeding up the tempo.
“I think our calling card has got to be playing with pace,” Hurley noted. “Using the three-point line as a weapon, being able to to attack on offense, and if we could do those things, then we'll be a little bit different. We're not going to be like a rugged style of basketball.”
This schematic style is similar to what Hurley was as a player. A small guard who relied on rapid speed and immense skill on the perimeter to execute at a high level, expect Hurley to allow his players freedom on offense to showcase his skills, resembling how Krzyzewski allowed the 53-year-old to play during his tenure.
“ I learned a lot from Coach K, and I've tried to use him as a model in some ways,” Hurley said. “How his relationships with the players and the pace of play allowed his players to play freely, I was able to play my style of basketball. He didn't hold me back at all, and I so more like general concepts.”
The hardwood and atmosphere of Cameron Indoor Stadium are going to test this ASU team to its limits ahead of the 2024-25 campaign, and Hurley will go back to his old territory with his insight on the difference that building makes when packed with ravaging students clear as day.
“You treat it exactly like a game,” Hurley said. “How we warm up, the crowd, that environment, it adds a different flavor to it just having a crowd there, and it's one of the great places that you could play a game road game.”
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