(Via UConn Athletics)
UConn men’s basketball head coach Dan Hurley has announced that Kimani Young has been named the program’s associate head coach.
Young is entering his third season on the UConn coaching staff, coming to UConn in April, 2018, shortly after Hurley took over the UConn program.
“Since we’ve been here, Coach Young’s contributions in coaching, recruiting and player development, as well as in the building of our culture, have been immeasurable,” Hurley said. “He is a leader of young men, who connects with young people and builds strong relationships both inside and outside our program.”
Young, 46, has been involved in all aspects of the UConn program. Working on the court mostly with the perimeter players, he already has helped three UConn players to all-conference status, including first-team pick Christian Vital last year. He has helped bring back-to-back Top 20 recruiting classes to Storrs, with a likely third one on the way.
“I am thrilled, excited and humbled to be named associate head coach at UConn,” Young said. “I would like to thank Coach Hurley and (AD) Dave Benedict for entrusting me with this responsibility.
“We will continue the work that we have started, getting UConn basketball back where it belongs.”
Besides the impact he has made at UConn, Young is also one of the founders of Coaches For Action, a group of 21 BIG EAST assistant basketball coaches, with a shared mission to use the platform of athletics to educate and bring awareness to social Injustices.
He was featured in The Athletic as one of 25 up-and-coming assistant coaches in the country and he also was one of just 50 assistant coaches invited to attend Nike’s 2015 Villa 7 Consortium, which introduces rising assistants to sitting athletic directors.
“Kimani is highly respected at all levels of basketball,” Hurley said. “He has all the tools to become a head coach in the near future.”
A native of Queens, N.Y., Young had two stints as athletic director of the New Heights Youth Program in New York City, with a year as the video coordinator at St. John’s in between.
He began his career as a college coach at Florida International under coach Richard Pitino and, after one year at FIU, was asked to go with Pitino to the University of Minnesota when Pitino took over that program. Young spent five years in Minnesota, establishing himself as an outstanding assistant coach and top-notch national recruiter before joining Hurley’s UConn staff in 2018.
(Release/Photo via UConn)
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