A dunk from Creighton’s Jamiya Neal Friday in the Bluejays’ Big East tournament semifinal win over the UConn Huskies took criticism and seemed to anger both Huskies’ players and head coach Dan Hurley.
NEAL WITH THE EXCLAMATION POINT 🔥 @jamiyaneal_ x @BluejayMBB pic.twitter.com/yR5mB6diQU
— FOX College Hoops (@CBBonFOX) March 15, 2025
However, as many noted, this came less than a month after Hurley’s own “Two rings!” trolling to Creighton fans after a regular-season win there (which saw extensive “F— Dan Hurley” chants):
“Bye! Bye! Two Rings! Two Rings!”
Dan Hurley hit Creighton fans with the ring point after UConn’s first win in Omaha.
📽️@GraceBBoyles #GoJays #RDJ pic.twitter.com/yN1zz1RCtA
— Clayton Collier (@ClaytonJCollier) February 12, 2025
Thus, the actions from Neal here and the reaction from Hurley sparked a lot of discussion, with much of that critical of Hurley:
I’ll say it again: Dan Hurley has become completely unlikable. https://t.co/Km6ZqR1TgG
— Joseph Royal (@thejosephroyal) March 15, 2025
I have zero problem with what Jamiya Neal just did. UConn and Dan Hurley deserves every last bit of that
If you can’t handle it, don’t dish it out
Such a poor sport of a program, head coach, and fan base
— Anthony Quagliano (@ViatorLion10) March 15, 2025
That was a Dan Hurleyesk play against a Dan Hurley coach team.
— BScottJr (@ScottjrBk) March 15, 2025
At any rate, Neal did offer an apology in a postgame press conference.
Jamiya Neal on the dunk and the altercation w/ Diarra:
“I would like to apologize for that. I respect Coach Hurley and the two-time defending national champs. I apologize and shouldn’t have did it.” https://t.co/YMCLCa8clR
— Adam Zagoria (@AdamZagoria) March 15, 2025
But UConn’s Hassan Diarra also discussed the issue he had with the dunk:
Hassan Diarra on the Jamiya Neal dunk”
“He went up for a fancy dunk and didn’t want to dribble the ball out. I just felt it was disrespectful to the game of basketball.” https://t.co/jCsja46ZAh
— Adam Zagoria (@AdamZagoria) March 15, 2025
It all led to quite a melancholy postgame presser from Hurley, including lines like “We’re not as good as we’ve been. We’re entitled to go wherever we go next and hopefully we get favorable matchups.” And that included shots of him facepalming while his players were being interviewed:
Dan Hurley in the postgame press conference after UConn lost to Creighton in the Big East Tournament. #MarchMadness
(via @CBBonFOX) pic.twitter.com/dofhUnObb9
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) March 15, 2025
Hurley is often an object of conversation in the college basketball world, and he’s also been known for some fiery interactions with officials and media. That included a line of “I think the press has been assholes to me all year” earlier this week, followed by “There are people acting far worse than me.”
Some of that seems to be getting extra notice with Hurley’s Huskies, the two-time defending champions, not having as strong of a year to this point. That’s what set up Neal for that trolling dunk, and what created another conversation around Hurley’s own past taunts.
