PHOENIX — Arizona State men’s basketball head coach Bobby Hurley received full backing from athletic director Graham Rossini on Thursday despite entering the final year of his contract.
It’s not going to be easy for Hurley, though, as he’s dealing with a nearly complete roster overhaul.
“We’ve got one returning player from last year (Trevor Best), and so I give Bobby and his coaches a lot of credit that they’ve they’ve taken this challenge on, and they understand that we didn’t retain some of the targets that we maybe anticipated,” Rossini said. “We didn’t get some of the incoming recruits that we felt like we were very deep on, but they’ve not backed off from the challenge. They’ve really been aggressive in finding the kind of complementary pieces that can create team basketball.
“But I believe in Bobby Hurley, and I know his back’s against the wall,” Rossini added. “I’m excited about how he’s responded. I’m excited about the work that his coaches have put in. We’ve tried to find all the ways that we can resource our men’s basketball program to compete in a very competitive environment.”
Arizona State went 13-20 in its first year in the Big 12.
Rossini, who is entering his second year as Arizona State’s athletic director, said a goal for ASU’s athletic department is to alleviate the business and entertainment side of sports for their coaches. The AD wants to help all of his coaches do what they do best: coach.
“We need Bobby Hurley to be the best basketball coach he can be,” Rossini said. “We don’t need him to be a media magnate and a ticket seller and a fundraiser — like, we should be taking that responsibility on. We should be freeing him up to lead his team and coach his players at the highest possible level.”
Rossini said he isn’t focused on contracts at the moment, but rather results. He isn’t looking at the basketball roster overhaul as a problem solely for the coaching staff.
It’s a challenge for both the coaches and the administration to solve together.
“I believe in Bobby Hurley, and we’re still developing our relationship,” the athletic director said. “We had a lot coming at us. Last summer as I took the job, we had this incredible rise going on in football, and I didn’t get a chance to spend as much time with Bobby late in the summer, early in the fall, as I would have hoped to. And so we’re still building, building our rapport. And I’m excited to lock arms with Bobby and his coaching staff and figure out, how do we do this together?”
“And, yeah, their backs against the wall,” Rossini said. “We don’t know what lives beyond next April at this point, but we’re also not reserving that that’s going to happen at any one specific moment. That’s going to happen when we get to a decision on where we go next. But for the time being, I want to build my relationship. I want to find out what role I can play in our department, can play in having men’s basketball be as successful as it can be, and we’re going to continue to push those levers together.”
At a press conference held in downtown Phoenix on Thursday, Rossini covered a multitude of topics, including the upcoming 2025-26 athletic season, possible Desert Financial Arena renovations and the state of all 26 sports programs at Arizona State.
Desert Financial Arena renovations timeline for ASU
Rossini said the official plan will be announced shortly, but the probable timeline for the multi-year, multi-phase renovations of the basketball teams’ Desert Financial Arena will begin in summer 2026.
“[We’re] hoping for next summer, right after graduation wraps up with a first phase,” Rossini said. “In a multi-year renovation. We’re going to try to maximize every day during the summer window. We’ve got the benefit, if we’re bleeding into the fall, Mullett Arena enters the conversation. We played volleyball there. We played some women’s basketball there.
“We’re trying to avoid that where we can use May in the summer months to get as much done over a series of years, to get (Desert Financial Arena) updated. And so those are the details that we’re still working through: the full scope, the full construction plan and what adjustments we need to make as a result.”
Rossini says ASU is not cutting sports
Amid uncertainty surrounding NIL reform and the recent House v. NCAA settlement, there have been concerns about whether Arizona State would continue to offer scholarships for all of 26 sports programs.
Rossini says it won’t be easy but reaffirmed Arizona State’s commitment to each of the 26 sports.
“It’s very challenging, but we want to continue to focus on ways that we can accomplish all 26 sports,” Rossini said. “We created them for a reason. They have value to ASU in terms of, again, the connection tool, and for such a dynamic university, such an international university. You look at a lot of our rosters, there’s international athletes on most of them, and that’s really important for our university. So we want to continue to do everything we can to maintain all 26.
“We’ve got 600 athletes from all over the world that are picking us,” Rossini added. “It’s our responsibility to lead them and prepare them for life after sport. We want Lu Dorts and NBA champions. We want Super Bowl MVPs. We want (swimmer) Leon Marchands and Olympians. But we want productive adults leading ASU, ready to take on whatever the world is going to put at them.”
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