After nine years, Bobby Hurley’s status in Tempe is up in the air, with news coming out this week he has yet to sign the contract extension he agreed to with Arizona State last year.
Under the terms of that unsigned deal, whichever school hired Hurley away from the Sun Devils would have had to pay the school a $2 million buyout. Such an obstacle may no longer be in place.
One way or another, Hurley and the Sun Devils put a final note on a miserable season on Wednesday, going out with a whimper to Utah in the opening round of the final Pac-12 Tournament, 90-57, to close out a bitter 14-18 year.
Further complicating matters, Arizona State is still in need of a full-time athletic director after the departure of Ray Anderson last year. With so much up in the air for those who back ASU at Arizona sportsbooks, BetArizona.com compiled a list of candidates who could replace Hurley if he leaves Tempe.
Arizona State Next Head Coach Odds
What Might be Next in Tempe?
Hurley has shown the type of potential ASU could have on the hardwood, taking the program as high as No. 3 in the Associated Press top 25 poll in the 2017-18 season while reaching the Big Dance three times in nine years.
With a record of 155-131 (.542) with the school, Hurley has the fourth-highest win percentage (.542) of any coach in the program’s modern (1958-present) era.
When it comes to potential ASU coaches, keep an eye on Kevin Kruger, who is the son of legendary coach Lon Kruger and played from 2003 to 2006 in Tempe under then-coach Herb Sendek.
The junior Kruger has gone 56-38 (.596) at UNLV between 2021-22 and 2023-24, including consecutive 19-win seasons that have the Running Rebels back in NCAA Tournament consideration for the first time since reaching the second round under Dave Rice in 2013.
Kruger (+200) tops our ASU list, though former Missouri State, Iowa, New Mexico and UCLA coach Steve Alford (+450) is right up there at +450, after leading the Nevada Wolf Pack to a 26-6 regular season in the Mountain West, which is the most he’s accumulated in his five year run in Reno.
The 59-year-old has gone 605-326 (.650) with the five schools he’s coached and would be a top tier candidate to rebuild ASU as it departs the Pac-12 for the basketball crazed confines of an expanded Big 12 in 2024.
Throw in crosstown candidate Bryce Drew of Grand Canyon (+500), who has the Lopes at 27-4 this season after going 23-8 and 24-12 in the last two seasons, as well as Washington State coach Kyle Smith (+1000) and Travis DeCuire of Montana (+1900). bet365 Arizona lists Drew’s team as +30000 to win the national title.
Smith led the Cougars to their best Pac-12 regular season standing (No. 2 overall) since finishing in that position under Tony Bennett in 2007 and would be a coup for whichever AD replaces Anderson in Tempe. DeCuire is the winningest head coach in Big Sky Conference history, going 200-123 (.619) in Missoula from 2015 to 2024, including a pair of NCAA Tournament berths in 2018 and 2019.
BetMGM Arizona lists Connecticut as the national championship favorite at +500. Houston is second at +600, followed by Purdue at +700. Arizona is fourth at +1100.
