NEW YORK — Alex Karaban tested the NBA waters, as they say, but always there was this one thought in back of his mind: The opportunity that was waiting at UConn.

He had the chance to be remembered as one of the most successful college basketball players in history. One of the winningest.

And it lured him back. With the season a couple of weeks away, how much does a potential three-peat drive Alex Karaban?

“I don’t think enough,” coach Dan Hurley said, wearing his dissatisfaction with the Huskies’ latest practice on his shirtsleeves. “If I was him, I’d be running around screaming at people, you know? If I had on the line what he has on the line this year, in terms of standing in sport, claim to career, the things he’s trying to do from the draft standpoint, I would get more lockstep in terms of it becoming more of an Alex-led team.”

If that sounded like a challenge, it was. If it sounded like a prod, it was. If it feels like a pitchfork in the tuchus when Karaban reads this, that would be the intent.

“I know he’s going to see this,” Hurley said, “and I’m communicating to him and to my team through you people.”

The “you people” was the throng of reporters, three or four-deep around Hurley, as they had been around Karaban Wednesday at Big East Media Day. After winning back-to-back national championships, and with no new Hall of Famers in the conference, center stage at Madison Square Garden was all Hurley’s and UConn’s.

And as we have learned, Hurley firmly believes the way to a young man’s heart is straight through the chest, once the proper level of trust is built. This unsubtle messaging was aimed at a player with whom Hurley says he “has a special bond,” who is “wired the same way.”

UConn has a chance to three-peat as national champions, which hasn’t been done in men’s basketball since UCLA in the 1960s and ’70s. Many believed Karaban would have been drafted if he chose to go pro after last season, but he turned back, as did Hurley when the Lakers called a few weeks later, for this quest.

“That’s one of the main reasons I did come back,” Karaban said. “I believe we have a great chance at chasing a three-peat and adding myself to history. If I can be one of the most winningest college players of all time, that’s something I never thought would happen when I went through the recruiting process in high school. I just can’t wait and I’ve got to make sure I get myself and the guys on the team to realize this moment is once-in-a-lifetime. We have an opportunity in front of us that we may never see again in college basketball.”

Teammates Hassan Diarra and Samson Johnson are also veterans of the Huskies’ 2022 and ’23 championship teams, but they played complementary roles and are just now expected to move into the starting lineup. Karaban, 6 feet 8, has been a starter almost from Day One at UConn. After enrolling as a redshirt in January 2022, he came off the bench in the season opener the following November and has started the 77 games in which he has played since, averaging 11.3 points, 4.8 rebounds, shooting 48.7 percent from the floor, 38.9 on threes. As the UConn offense has evolved into the creative, complex, Euro-inspired things of beauty that had the basketball world buzzing last March, Karaban was one of the important components.

But Jordan Hawkins, Andre Jackson, Adama Sanogo, Donovan Clingan, Tristen Newton, Stephon Castle and Cam Spencer have all come and gone on to the NBA. Only Alex Karaban, 21, is walking through that door.

Yet, Karaban was not on AP’s All-America preseason team, was not the Big East Preseason Player of the Year (that went to Creighton’s Ryan Kalkbrenner). He was a member of the conference’s first team.

“Alex does (an ineffective) job of drawing attention to himself, besides winning championships,” Hurley said. “Accomplishing what he has accomplished in his career, if he did more TikToks, if he did more things to draw attention to himself, he would have solidified his preseason All-American status with AP. You’re rewarding the wrong things if you don’t reward a back-to-back champion, two-year starter, one of the best players in the Big East.”

However, individual awards, individual stats or records, are not what Karaban was after when he chose to return to school. There is nothing to prove, only something to achieve, only history to be made. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar played a prominent role on UCLA’s champions in 1969, ’70 and ’71 — that kind of history.

“I thought about it more and more during the NBA process and realized that I really can be one of the winningest college basketball player of all time,” Karaban said. “I didn’t want to leave that what-if up for grabs if I went in the NBA. I really wanted to see how this year would pan out and being able to experience this year, I’m super excited about it and to have that chance of being the winningest player, that’s just enough motivation for me to go out there and work harder and leave better.”

John Wooden’s UCLA teams had stability that is 180-degrees apart from what happens in college basketball today, which adds to the challenge of what UConn, and Karaban, are attempting to do. It creates the need for a maniacal pursuit, and that’s what Hurley is asking. It will take everything his players have to give, more than they may believe they have to give, to overcome the odds against three-peating in this sport.

“Alex is incredible in leading by example, work ethic, knowing where to be,” Hurley said. “He’s on-point every way, but be more like on his teammates right now, holding people accountable more, which is tough for this generation because we’ve made people softer, particularly young men, we’ve made them softer by not giving them tough love. … But if had on the line what he does? I would just be breathing fire on a daily basis.”

____

©2024 Hartford Courant. Visit courant.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.