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Before Dan Hurley’s UConn master class, he was a high school history teacher

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Before Dan Hurley’s UConn master class, he was a high school history teacher

Juan Santamaria’s World History II teacher comes up often, more than any 38-year-old’s high school teacher should. Santamaria recently attended a soccer event in Kansas City and found himself in a crowd of basketball fans. He noticed a man reading “The Miracle of St. Anthony,” a book about legendary high school basketball coach Bob Hurley Sr.

“You know, I know his son, Dan Hurley,” Santamaria said.

“No way,” the man replied. “I love Dan.”

“I’m serious,” Santamaria said. “He was my history teacher.”

His audience wasn’t buying it.

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“Yes,” Santamaria said. “That’s how he started.”

UConn coach Dan Hurley has spoken often about his days at St. Benedict’s Preparatory School in Newark, N.J., and how they shaped the man he is now: an elite college basketball coach, winner of the last two men’s national titles, who this summer turned down a chance to coach the Los Angeles Lakers.

Not as much is known about Hurley’s days as a teacher, a role often required of high school coaches. He referenced them during a news conference in April at the Final Four in Arizona, discussing how he learned to control a classroom, first at St. Anthony, where he taught health, physical education, sex education and driver’s education, then at St. Benedict’s, where he worked from 2001 to 2010.

How did this ultra-intense coach, one with a red-faced reputation for challenging players and officials, adapt to the classroom, teaching the French Revolution and the collapse of the Roman Empire?

Informed recently that The Athletic had spoken with about a dozen former St. Benedict’s students, as well as leadership and faculty, about his teaching days, Hurley laughed. “Oh, God,” he said, as if unsure of what was to come. A liberal studies major at Seton Hall with a minor in criminal justice, Hurley said teaching World History II was probably the most nervous he’s been in his life. He also doesn’t think he’s ever worked harder.

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St. Benedict’s in the early 2000s had a diverse enrollment of about 500. It was an all-boys school, grades seven through 12. The school calendar included out-of-classroom sessions designed to get students involved in community service or other activities such as hiking or martial arts. The dress code was button-down shirts with ties, although in later years this changed to hoodies.

Hurley, who had just lost his job as an assistant coach at Rutgers, worked in admissions in addition to coaching and teaching. He was 28 and married with a 2-year-old son. On most days, his work schedule unfolded like this:

8:30-11 a.m.: Teaching history. World History II, which most students took as sophomores, covered European history, starting with the Middle Ages. Leading up to his first week, Hurley studied beyond the textbook because he was convinced “some wise-ass kids were going to test me.” Those close to him, however, thought it was a good fit.

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“I thought history was probably up his alley because it’s a lot of memorization,’’ said Hurley’s older brother, Arizona State coach Bobby Hurley. “You don’t have to do labs or anything. If he was doing that, I’d be scared he might blow the school up or something.”

11 a.m.-2 p.m.: Visiting schools. Driving a school-issued vehicle, Hurley would visit grade schools in Newark, Irvington and East Orange and talk to students about the benefits of St. Benedict’s. This showcased Hurley’s people skills, overlooked throughout his career in basketball.

“He’s one of those guys, if people catch him getting on a player or getting on an official, it’s, ‘Oh, that’s what he’s like,’” said P.J. Carlesimo, who coached Hurley at Seton Hall. “But if you talk to the players in particular, or guys he taught, they’d say, ‘No, no, no.’ They’d do anything for him.”

3-6 p.m.: Coaching basketball. Hurley would finish his practice plan and run practice. Some nights the Gray Bees might have a game. Others, he’d stay late and greet visitors at a school fair. If nothing else, Hurley would return home and grade papers.

Father Edwin Leahy, the headmaster at St. Benedict’s, never doubted Hurley would put in the work, mostly because Hurley had watched his dad do it for years at St. Anthony, where he had won 26 state championships.

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“St. Anthony was just a tiny little box in the middle of Jersey City right before the Holland Tunnel and everybody did whatever they had to do to make the thing work,’’ Leahy said. “Danny grew up in that kind of an environment of watching these adults, whether they were the religious sisters or the lay people who would do whatever they had to do. So teaching history, I don’t think it was something that he was excited about at first, but he knew you did whatever you had to do.”

Former students describe Hurley mostly in three ways: He had a presence. He had a sense of humor. And he had swag.

“Growing up as a kid in the inner city, in Newark or anywhere around there, you knew all the neighbors,” said Joe Carratura, Class of 2004. “You could play outside all day long. Everybody sat on their stoop. Miss Susie down the street was your babysitter. It was just a community, and he felt like he belonged there.”

Marc Onion taught English. Shortly after Hurley’s hire, Onion went and watched a summer basketball workout. He noticed the AC was shut off and Hurley had his guys playing not full court but full gym, with the bleachers pulled back. No out of bounds. No fouls. Just grab the ball and go. A test of wills.

In the classroom, Onion noticed a different environment but similar control. Hurley walked around the room. He posted up in the corner. He never sat behind his desk. “He’d sit along the front edge and sort of be the big commander over the kids in the room,” Onion said. “He had the wherewithal to know that, ‘All right, I’m going to be attentive to every guy in this space just by being in really close proximity.’”

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“I think the worst thing sometimes to say about the teacher and the class is there’s no discipline,” Hurley said. “Like, ‘The kids show no respect for the teacher.’ So for me it felt like if I ever went behind the desk, my presence wouldn’t be just as strong. And I’d be opening up the door for some level of anarchy.”

Most of Hurley’s classes had 20 or so students. Some called him “Coach.” Others called him “Hurley.” He assigned them nicknames. If someone wore a Dennis Rodman jersey, he became “Rodman” for the rest of the school year. If someone had slicked-back hair, he became “Slick.” Santamaria, a 2004 grad, was shortened to “Santa-man.”

Hurley announced test scores by football position and jersey number. Those who scored in the 80s were wide receivers. We got a Jerry Rice. Those who failed, scoring in the 20s, for example, would get a running back. Oh, we got an Emmitt Smith over here.

Certain positions you’d want to avoid, Hurley said.

“You would go in there and you’d know there was going to be a joke here and there,” Santamaria said. “I enjoyed his class because I knew there was going to be banter. There was going to be some humor, some zings being thrown around, which always made it fun.”

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Hurley wore khakis and a basketball pullover. (“I’ve never been a clothes person,” he said.) He walked with swagger. Students called it the “Hurley Shuffle” and tried to mimic it in the hallway. “People have always made fun of the way I walk,” Hurley said. He had receding hair and a growing midsection. At lunch, Hurley would go with faculty members to Branch Brook Park where he would grab a few hot dogs with sauerkraut, onions or chili. Plan B was pizza.

His teaching style was direct. One student described it as, “Don’t bust my balls, I won’t bust yours.” Another joked that he felt like he had to get his work done because he didn’t want to have to run line drills in the gym. Nearly all agreed Hurley held them accountable.

“He cared about what he was doing and he cared about the kids that were with him,” said Jim Duffy, who also taught history. “I mean, the nickname stuff sounds cutesy, but to a certain extent that becomes a way of classroom management. Which is a whole trick to teaching because if you can’t manage a classroom, they’re going to eat you alive, whether you’re the basketball coach or not.”


Hurley’s second consecutive national title put him in rarefied air, but he still thinks of his high school coaching days. (Jamie Squire/Getty Images)

St. Benedict’s allowed students to hold jobs around the school. The program was designed to teach responsibility, while putting money in students’ pockets. Marcos Novoa’s job was to clean the gym, which included Hurley’s office.

Novoa didn’t have Hurley in class. He wasn’t much of a basketball fan. But nearly every day, he entered Hurley’s office, which was the size of a cubicle, and cleaned out his garbage or straightened his desk. He was a jokester. Hurley was a jokester. They got along well.

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“We were all kids, but it almost felt like he could be one of us,” said Novoa, now a police officer in New Jersey. “If I had an issue, and I didn’t want to bring it to anyone important so to speak, I would probably feel more comfortable going to him first. To me, he was somebody I could relate to a little bit more than others.”

Mike Malinowski credits Hurley for getting him started on his path to teaching. One day in the fall of 2003, he was eating breakfast in the school cafeteria when Hurley and another teacher called him over. They asked Malinowski about his college plans. Malinowski listed four schools he was considering. Hurley told him he needed to choose Rutgers.

“He put me on that trajectory,’’ said Malinowski, now in his 15th year as a teacher. “I attended that university because of him. I went there, I met my wife. I got involved with a bunch of other great teachers and professors. I mean, indirectly, did it eventually lead me to become a teacher? … I can’t lie and say I became a teacher because of him, but I would be remiss if I didn’t say I’m a better teacher because of my experience with him.”

As a basketball coach, Hurley took St. Benedict’s to a national level. He went 223-21 over nine years, agonizing over each loss as Hurleys do. If St. Benedict’s had a difficult game coming up, he would have a test or a History Channel video ready for the next day’s class, something that would give him time to reset should the Gray Bees lose. Calling out was not something teachers did at St. Benedict’s. Hurley doesn’t recall taking one sick day in nine years.

(Speaking of losing, when Hurley called last spring to discuss the Lakers job, Leahy told him he was out of his mind and needed to think of his wife, Andrea. “You’re going to lose more games with the Lakers than you’re going to lose at UConn, and you’re a mental case when you lose,” Leahy said he told Hurley. “You’re going to come home to Andrea and she’s going to hit you over the head with a pot. You can’t do that.”)

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Most of the St. Benedict’s students who spoke to The Athletic have followed Hurley’s career. From Wagner to Rhode Island, then to Connecticut, where the 51-year-old is starting his seventh season, they still see the same guy. Most said that if they would cross Hurley on the sidewalk, he may not know their names, but he would recognize their faces.

“I’m pretty sure if you put us in a room with Hurley, he’s gonna be the same exact person he was 20 years ago,” said Rui Ribeiro, a 2005 grad. “He’s going to crack jokes and make fun of this and talk about that. That’s just the type of person he is, which is good. You shouldn’t change just because you’re succeeding in life.”

Hurley, who was recently inducted into the St. Benedict’s Hall of Fame, said teaching was a lot like coaching. Classes were like practices. Tests and quizzes were like games. He wanted to show students he was prepared. He wanted to make it fun. He wanted to show he cared. Looking back, he considers it the most important time of his professional life, which is why he once talked with Leahy about returning one day to teach history and coach ball, a career come full circle.

With UConn about to chase a third consecutive national title, Hurley knows this seems far-fetched.

“I’ve always in my mind … who knows at the end whether you’ve had enough of the high end of sports and you just wanted to get back to pure coaching or an experience like that,” he said, before pausing. “In the end, maybe. Who knows.”

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(Top photo: Michael Reaves / Getty Images)

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Champions League Briefing: Does this make Amorim the new Fergie? Why did Vinicius Jr. stand still?

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13 hours ago

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November 6, 2024

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Champions League Briefing: Does this make Amorim the new Fergie? Why did Vinicius Jr. stand still?

Just when you thought the Champions League group stage was becoming predictable…

Manchester City and Real Madrid, the two teams mostly likely to win it all this season, took two beatings Tuesday night that shook the competition up.

New Manchester United boss Ruben Amorim quite possibly saved his best for last at Sporting CP, signing off from his final home game with a 4-1 victory over Manchester City. Meanwhile, AC Milan added to Madrid’s many problems in Spain’s capital with a 3-1 victory.

The third most likely team to win the 2024-25 Champions League? Liverpool. And they brushed aside Bayer Leverkusen and Xabi Alonso 4-0 at Anfield to reinforce their credentials.

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These are the big talking points from Tuesday’s action.

Does this make Amorim the new Fergie? 

“If we win they’ll think the new Alex Ferguson has arrived, which is very difficult to maintain,” Amorim said.

Arise, Sir Ruben. His words, spoken on the eve of his final home match in charge of Sporting, feel pretty pertinent, don’t they?

Manchester United are now favourites for the 2025-26 Premier League title and Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City dynasty is about to come crumbling down.

Okay, fine, let’s just calm down a bit. But also, let’s get massively carried away with this remarkable result.

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Two years ago Manchester City blitzed the Portuguese team 5-0 on aggregate in the Champions League last 16, but on Tuesday they showcased just why United were so keen to land Amorim after his team walloped Guardiola’s shellshocked side.

It must have been an incredibly bittersweet night for Sporting’s fans, who celebrated one of the best victories in the club’s recent history knowing they may not see the like again for a while. They said goodbye with a huge tifo which read “Obrigada” (thank you) and Amorim returned the favour with a night to remember.

In the battle of the Nordic goal-loving strikers, the clear winner was Viktor Gyokeres, whose hat-trick took his tally to 23 goals in 15 matches for club and country this season. He has only failed to score in three games.


(Gualter Fatia/Getty Images)

Amorim will surely want to take Gyokeres with him to Old Trafford via a rumoured €100 million release clause, although with Ineos tightening the purse strings, perhaps the Etihad, with the soon-to-be director of football Hugo Viana, who leaves Sporting at the end of the season, might be a more likely destination. Gyokeres and Erling Haaland up front together? The nets will need reinforcing.

The two managers won’t have to wait long for a rematch. If Amorim can do the same with Rasmus Hojlund or Joshua Zirkzee up front when his Manchester United team takes on City and Guardiola on December 15th, you can make plans for the statue already.

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Inconsistent Milan turn it on at the Bernabeu

AC Milan’s 3-1 victory in the Bernabeu was as surprising and stunning as Sporting’s win.

Milan can be infuriatingly inconsistent – they’re a lowly seventh in Serie A, already eight points off leaders Napoli, albeit with a game in hand. They lost their first two Champions League matches (to Liverpool and Bayer Leverkusen) before struggling past 10-man Club Bruges to claim their first victory on Matchday 3.

Here, though, they were at their very best, and uncoincidentally so were Rafael Leao and Theo Hernandez, who on their day must be one of the most exciting left-sided pairs in European football.

New manager Paulo Fonseca boldly dropped both of them earlier in the season and Leao has been left on the bench in the league lately, but as Alvaro Morata told The Athletic last week, “He’s the best player on the team and just needs to keep doing what he’s doing.”

Morata restored Milan’s lead when putting them 2-1 up after Leao’s shot was saved. Leao then set up Dutch midfielder Tijjani Reijnders, who had scored twice against Bruges last time out, to seal a memorable victory in this clash of European football giants.

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(Angel Martinez/Getty Images)

With AC Milan now facing Slovan Bratislava, Red Star Belgrade, Girona and Dinamo Zagreb in their final four matches, the path of progression to the last 16 via an automatic qualification spot should be straightforward.

But only if they can find that elusive consistency.

Noel Gallagher was City’s best performer on the night

If you thought TNT Sports were dumbing down their coverage even more by inviting Oasis legend Noel Gallagher into the commentary box for City’s game at Sporting, well, you would be wrong.

In what probably says far more about the standard of punditry on English football screens, Gallagher was a breath of fresh air in that he spoke common sense. Yes, it’s a wacky concept, stick with us.

Sure, he said ‘we’ when talking about his beloved City, but this was no Sky Sports Fan Zone gimmick, nor was he overly biased. (He thought the decision to award City a penalty for handball was harsh and questioned things like bringing Kevin De Bruyne on for the final seven minutes, probably fearing for his hamstrings.)

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There was no melodrama, silly noises, or horrible ‘banter’ like you get when certain other pundits talk about the teams they support.

But Gallagher is an actual fan (he was in the away end at Bournemouth on Saturday) and just says things like they are, backed here by insight and statistics, and even a foreshadowing of City wasting chances and needing to score a second goal — which came 37 seconds before Sporting equalised. It would be easy to ridicule his comments because he’s Noel Gallagher, like comparing Gyokeres’ penalty technique to Troy Deeney’s, until you stop and realise that it’s true.

He did let himself down by saying, “Some songwriting genius wrote once; ‘We see things they’ll never see’, and that’s Guardiola for ya,” leading to raucous laughter from commentator Darren Fletcher. But we’ll forgive him that one.

Anyway, Gallagher’s was probably the best City performance of the night as they suffered a third successive defeat in all competitions for the first time in six-and-a-half years.

They wasted chances in the opening half an hour, only having Phil Foden’s fourth-minute goal to show for their dominance, then Haaland blasted a penalty against the bar when he had the chance to pull it back to 3-2.

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Injuries are clearly having an impact, particularly in defence with teenager Jahmai Simpson-Pusey making his first senior start at the back. With 73 per cent possession and 20 shots to nine, it’s not as if City were outplayed, far from it.

But they really are missing Rodri, who may become a more deserved winner of the Ballon d’Or in some people’s eyes by virtue of not playing.

Speaking of which…

Vinicius Jr. stood tall, then stood still

It was a mixed night for Vinicius Junior, who was having a good evening when he levelled things for Real Madrid with a Panenka penalty, minutes after the Bernabeu had booed the Champions League anthem to express their displeasure at him not winning the Ballon d’Or.

Vinicius Jr had won the penalty himself from a foul by former Tottenham Hotspur defender Emerson Royal, but from then on Madrid melted and the sight of Vinicius Jr. stood completely still as an Aurelien Tchouameni pass didn’t reach him (seconds later Milan were 2-1 up) was one of the night’s defining images.

So too was Jude Bellingham kicking a water bottle in frustration after being substituted.

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This was Madrid’s second defeat of the competition in four games (they also lost 1-0 at Lille) and, coming off the back of the 4-0 humiliation at home to Barcelona in their last league match, it encapsulates a season that is threatening to unravel.

They will surely still reach at least a play-off for the last 16 with ease, but with a trip to Liverpool next on Matchday 5, the usually composed Carlo Ancelotti may have to start sweating a little.

Alonso’s Leverkusen stumbling as Slot’s Liverpool fly

Anfield is not a place you want to have to go and get a result right now.

Liverpool maintained one of only two 100 per cent records in the new Champions League format (the other being *checks notes* Aston Villa, who visit Club Bruges on Wednesday) with a serene 4-0 victory over Bayer Leverkusen.

In contrast to Amorim, whose stock is sky high as he prepares to move to the Premier League, Xabi Alonso’s reputation is starting to take a little bit of a hit, just months after he was touted as the best thing since sliced bread but resisted the temptation of a Premier League move.

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Arne Slot got the Liverpool call instead and the above stats reflect, yet again, how he has got this Liverpool team purring very quickly.

Luis Diaz scored a second half hat-trick including a chip that could only have looked more delicious with a dollop of mayonnaise on the end.

Slot and Liverpool are flying at the top of the Premier League and the Champions League. Alonso and Leverkusen were never going to reach the impeccable heights of 2023-24, but the difficult second-season syndrome is kicking in.

Tuesday’s results

  • PSV 4 Girona 0
  • Slovan Bratislava 1 Dinamo Zagreb 4
  • Bologna 0 Monaco 1
  • Borussia Dortmund 1 Sturm Graz 0
  • Celtic 3 RB Leipzig 1
  • Lille 1 Juventus 1
  • Liverpool 4 Bayer Leverkusen 0
  • Real Madrid 1 AC Milan 3
  • Sporting 4 Manchester City 1

What’s next?

The remaining nine fixtures for match-week four of the eight-round league phase take place on Wednesday.

  • Club Bruges vs Aston Villa (5.45pm BST/12.45pm ET)
  • Shakhtar Donetsk vs Young Boys (5.45pm BST/12.45pm ET)
  • Bayern Munich vs Benfica (8pm BST/3pm ET)
  • Feyenoord vs Red Bull Salzburg (8pm BST/3pm ET)
  • Inter Milan vs Arsenal (8pm BST/3pm ET)
  • Paris Saint-Germain vs Atletico Madrid (8pm BST/3pm ET)
  • Red Star Belgrade vs Barcelona (8pm BST/3pm ET)
  • Sparta Prague vs Brest (8pm BST/3pm ET)
  • Stuttgart vs Atalanta (8pm BST/3pm ET)

(Gualter Fatia/Getty Images)

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Conrad Harder: The prolific Sporting Lisbon teenager aiming to emulate Haaland

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1 day ago

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November 5, 2024

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Conrad Harder: The prolific Sporting Lisbon teenager aiming to emulate Haaland

A coffee wagon that has been converted into a portable video analysis hub is making its way back into the FC Nordsjaelland (FCN) training base when the sudden thud of  football on crossbar brings it to a halt.

It is the very specific sound of a Conrad Harder effort on goal, a missile that can be launched by his left foot, right foot or head — one that Manchester City will come face-to-face with on Tuesday when they take on his new side, Sporting Lisbon, in the Champions League.

On The Athletic’s visit to Nordsjaelland in the summer, analysts linger in the centre of the pitch to observe this crossing and finishing competition between Harder and reserve goalkeeper William Lykke, also 19, at the end of training.

Former Chelsea and Ghana midfielder Michael Essien, now the assistant manager at Nordsjaelland, is on crossing duty and there is barely a delivery across the 20 minutes that is not devoured by Harder.

The Dane can do finesse but, when it comes to his preferred finishing style, it is Harder by name, harder by nature. Even the under-10 team’s training session was paused as the youngsters watched and gasped in disbelief.

There is no waiting for the ball to drop. Harder takes on every shot as early as possible. He strikes volleys as if seeing the ball like a watermelon and, when it is airborne, his hang-time is reminiscent of a certain Portuguese forward.

“My idol was Cristiano Ronaldo… but then Erling Haaland came along,” Harder tells The Athletic once the session is complete.

It is helpful that the teenager introduces Manchester City star Haaland into the conversation himself. As a tall Scandinavian striker with bulging thighs, bouncing blond hair and a left foot with the power to outpace Hawk-Eye’s ball-tracking technology, the comparison is inescapable. Five years Haaland’s junior, Harder does not want talk of the Norway international to become an albatross around his neck. “He is a really good player and I’m watching his game to try to learn and go in this direction,” Harder says.

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“People compare a lot, especially with (Manchester United’s Danish forward Rasmus) Hojlund, who is also scoring goals now, but I don’t want to be one of them. I just want to be my own (man). That is the way I think.”

This conversation took place in July and, since then, the Danish striker has been involved in a transfer tug-of-war, rejecting Brighton & Hove Albion on deadline day to sign for Ruben Amorim’s Sporting in a €20million (£16.8m; $22.1m) transfer.

So far he has come off the bench in two of Sporting’s Champions League matches and on his league debut registered his first goal and assist against Avs FS. He added a brace against Portimonense in the Taca de Portugal last month.

From the sidelines, Harder looks huge, but up close his boyish appearance is startling. Nicknamed ‘Mosquito’ by Nordsjaelland team-mate Mario Dorgeles due to his fear of those insects when visiting the Right to Dream academy in Ghana two years ago, he conveys the aura of someone who already sees himself as a leader in the team.

During FCN’s small-sided training games with rolling substitutions, Harder’s competitive edge is obvious as he laments goalkeeping mistakes and harries defenders as if his life depends on it. He is more of an all-round player than a pure poacher but it is clear he lives for scoring goals, which is why he is described by some at FCN as “goal horny” — a Danish way of saying he is not overly happy when he does not put the ball in the back of the net.

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Harder in action against Fenerbahce in last season’s Europa Conference League (Sergei Gapon/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Harder was having his breakout year with Nordsjaelland but, such is his talent, it was curtailed by that deadline-day transfer tussle between Brighton and Sporting, with Italy’s Napoli the other interested party earlier in the summer.

Clubs had been aware of his talent for some time, due to his goalscoring record for Nordsjaelland at youth level. He got 15 in 18 games for the under-17s, and 26 in 22 for the under-19s, but he still had to be patient before breaking into the first team.

Harder made his senior debut in the final game of the 2022-23 season and then made 33 appearances across all competitions in the last one — just nine from the start — scoring seven goals. In the early weeks of this season, he had started all six league games, scoring twice in a 2-2 draw with Midtjylland and producing a clever assist for what turned out to be the winner as they beat FC Copenhagen 3-2.

The plan was never for Harder to move on during the summer window. Indeed, Brighton were originally looking at next summer as the ideal time to pounce, but Sporting coming in so strongly forced them to act earlier.

This was to be Harder’s first season as a regular starter for Nordsjaelland, where he would be given space to develop and adjust to senior football. He even signed a new four-year contract in the summer, a step that underlined that intent, but money talks and, once the threshold of €20m was breached, the club had to accept he was off.

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The pathway presented by Brighton was for him to go out on loan before becoming a first-team player. In their favour they had evidence of managing a phased integration from Danish football to the Premier League as they signed Simon Adingra from FCN in summer 2022 before sending him to Belgian sister side Union Saint-Gilloise for a season. He returned a more experienced player and is now an important part of the Brighton squad.

Although Viktor Gyokeres is the main man at Sporting, they could offer Harder an immediate role in the squad and, ultimately, that swayed his decision. It was earlier than those who have overseen his development would have liked him to make that step and there is the risk that such a leap this early into his career could be too much, but he backs himself and believes he will be a success in Portugal. The riches of Premier League football will always be on offer if that is the case.

Nordsjaelland have sold over £90m worth of African talent developed at their Right To Dream academy in Ghana, but Harder was the latest off the conveyor belt from their Danish academy, with Andreas Skov Olsen of Belgium’s Club Bruges and Brentford duo Mikkel Damsgaard and Mathias Jensen all previously moving for sizeable fees.


Adingra has excelled at Brighton (Jan Kruger/Getty Images)

Harder’s decision to move to Sporting was not the first tough call he has had to make. At 14, he decided to leave FC Copenhagen and move to Nordsjaelland.

“I didn’t develop as much as I wanted, so I wanted a new challenge and FCN was a good option for me,” Harder explains.

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“I don’t know if there is a secret (in the way Nordsjaelland operate), but there are so many coaches around you all the time, working on the details at every training, it definitely helps. It is easy to go in the first-team squad, as you have been learning the same playing style the whole way.”

Harder may want to avoid too many comparisons with Haaland and Hojlund, but he does share an agent with the latter’s two younger twin brothers, Oscar and Emil, who play in Germany for Eintracht Frankfurt and Schalke respectively.

People at Nordsjaelland always knew he was destined for big things. They just did not expect that day to come so soon.

Whether Harder is ready is another question, but he does not come across as a teenager who will be daunted by a price tag or the shadows of Scandinavian strikers looming large.

(Top photo: Maciej Rogowski/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

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Paige Bueckers vs. JuJu Watkins: How UConn, USC stars will keep women’s basketball in spotlight

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1 day ago

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November 5, 2024

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Paige Bueckers vs. JuJu Watkins: How UConn, USC stars will keep women’s basketball in spotlight

USC head coach Lindsay Gottlieb noticed a stranger approaching. She thought maybe she had spilled something and he was going to give her a heads-up. Instead, he stopped near their table and paused.

“Hey, Coach,” he said. “I thought it was you. I’ve gotta ask …”

She waited.

“Is JuJu really 6 foot 2?” he asked.

Gottlieb laughed. She answered — yes, JuJu Watkins is listed at 6 feet 2 — then joked that it depends on how much of Watkins’ iconic bun is counted. A big guard in the even bigger Big Ten was an enticing prospect for this L.A. sports fan. Even in the summer, he was eagerly anticipating the season, which will see USC — a team that appeared on national networks just three times last season before its postseason run to the Elite Eight — on ESPN, FOX, FS1 and NBC nine times before the Big Ten tournament.

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He thanked Gottlieb, wished her luck and went on his way.

The exchange felt oddly familiar to Gottlieb, just not as the head coach of USC, a program she took over in 2021 when it was a basement dweller in the Pac-12. Instead, it reminded her of experiences during two seasons as a Cleveland Cavaliers assistant, when insatiable NBA fans wanted to break down every potential matchup and moment.

“For those of us who have really followed this game for a long time, we’ve known there have been great players before, we’ve known the great stories before, but now to see the rest of the world catch on and pay attention is really cool,” Gottlieb said. “Then you add to it this kind of position I’ve been thrust into, where we’re one of the programs that has one of these star players who is getting a ton of this attention. It’s a great responsibility. It’s a great opportunity.

“None of it is lost on me, that we’re sort of in the apex of this moment.”

More than 2,500 miles across the country, UConn coach Geno Auriemma can relate. For nearly four decades, some of the greatest stars to play the game have come through the Huskies’ gym. Yet the fanfare didn’t match what he saw on the men’s side.

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Until now.

In early October, UConn announced it had sold out its season ticket packages for the first time since the 2004-05 season, after Diana Taurasi won a national championship as a senior.

That didn’t happen during the Maya Moore or Breanna Stewart years, or after 111 straight wins or four straight national titles. Not until now — Paige Bueckers’ final season in Storrs.

“There are people who have never had an opinion that have an opinion now or they want to know things that they never wanted to know, but now they’re familiar with names and events that in the past they wouldn’t think twice of,” Auriemma said. “The die-hard fans, they can’t wait for the season to start. But the casual fan has tuned in and got a sip of it, and now they’re intrigued.”

That groundswell of attention for women’s basketball is undeniable. Every number backs it up. Last season’s NCAA Tournament set viewership records, including a title game that drew 18.9 million viewers (besting the men’s title game by nearly 4 million, something most fans assumed could never happen). Iowa star Caitlin Clark’s uncanny knack for the big moment and ability to nail logo 3s drew in millions, but those fans found other players, teams and games to enjoy. Even taking Iowa’s NCAA Tournament games out of the equation, last year’s ESPN viewership rose 43 percent during March Madness.

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Clark’s draw, as well as Angel Reese’s at LSU, continued into the WNBA. Indiana Fever attendance and viewership numbers soared; the same was true for Reese’s Chicago Sky. Again, these new WNBA fans stayed for the other massive talents.


Paige Bueckers’ Huskies bested JuJu Watkins’ Trojans in the Elite Eight, but both players registered 20-point double-doubles. (Steph Chambers / Getty Images)

Stars propel sports and leagues. They lure casual observers and convert them to die-hards. After Clark and Reese departed for the WNBA, there’s no letdown for college basketball stars helping carry the sport’s weight, but attention will be focused on two.

Anchoring two coasts, two conferences and two national title contenders are USC’s Watkins and UConn’s Bueckers. They’re playing at programs that are iconic in their own ways and recognizable worldwide. They’re both elite — potentially generational — and have the ball in their hands more than almost anyone else.

Watkins is the reigning Freshman of the Year attempting to resurrect the Trojans, who haven’t been relevant in her lifetime. She’s the hometown kid who turned out stars like Kevin Hart, Saweetie, LeBron James and John Wall at last season’s home games. The smoothness to her game and effortless quality make it seem like she has never rushed on the floor, whether she’s pulling up from 3 or attacking the basket (or hitting a shot anywhere in between).

Bueckers, who won national Player of the Year as a freshman four years ago, is in her final season at UConn. Even with its vaunted legacy, few high school players were more heralded coming into Storrs than she was. And yet, in her fifth year, a national championship — of which UConn has won 11 — has eluded Bueckers. She’s a rangy guard with enough savvy inside that even when she played the four last season, she was still named an All-American. A player so confident that she trademarked her nickname, “Paige Buckets,” before her sophomore season.

Watkins’ and Bueckers’ play, storylines and celebrity, as well as USC and UConn’s December meeting (a rematch of last season’s Elite Eight) are reasons people, including new fans, will tune in for women’s hoops this season.

But unlike players before them with those same attributes, they’re competing at a time of unprecedented transformation.

Because of an investigation that exposed grievous disparities in NCAA men’s and women’s basketball, the NCAA was forced to invest more in the women’s NCAA Tournament. Because of growing attention, ESPN — the women’s NCAA Tournament media partner — anted up last year and paid big money for the media rights to broadcast the event. Because of NIL, players such as Bueckers and Watkins are recognizable outside of women’s basketball circles, partnering with major companies like Nike and Gatorade. Watkins was spotted at the 2024 Cannes Lions Festival, threw out the first pitch at a June Los Angeles Dodgers game and won the ESPY for Best Breakthrough Athlete. Bueckers attended the U.S. Open, where Frances Tiafoe and Coco Gauff shouted her out, sat front row at New York Fashion Week and was featured on the JumboTron at a Los Angeles Rams game.

“There’s no boundaries on us, and because of that, you’re seeing talent, you’re seeing coaching, you’re seeing fan support, you’re seeing viewership — you’re seeing all of those things,” South Carolina coach Dawn Staley said. “This is probably the biggest movement in our game in its history, and it couldn’t happen at a more perfect time. … There are so many people tuned in; we met the moment.”

To continue meeting that moment, women’s basketball needs the next wave of stars. It needs teams with compelling storylines (Staley’s Gamecocks are a perfect example as reigning champs coming back to repeat after an undefeated season), but it also needs individuals like Watkins and Bueckers, whose stories and journeys this season will be as compelling as their play on the floor.

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“It’s great that we have them because it would be a shame to follow up the star power of last year and then not be able to add to it this season,” Auriemma said. “We need to showcase these guys and these teams, and we need to play well. We need to give all these new people that are going to be watching something to be excited about so they want to come back.”

If Bueckers and Watkins do what their coaches believe, then new fans will certainly have reasons to keep tuning in and finding their next favorite players once Bueckers and Watkins move on to the pros.

Auriemma and Gottlieb, who have been around this game for decades, know this moment isn’t just different; it’s long overdue. What comes next (or, really, who comes next) will be what pushes the sport forward.

(Illustration: Meech Robinson / The Athletic; Top photos of Paige Bueckers and JuJu Watkins: G Fiume / Getty Images, Brian Rothmuller / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

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