New York — When Geno Auriemma first heard about UConn returning to the Big East, he thought about one thing as far as the big picture.

And it had nothing to do with his women's basketball program.

"The initial reaction from me was, this changes the game for men's basketball at the University of Connecticut," Auriemma said after the official announcement in New York Thursday at Madison Square Garden.

Sure, Auriemma is looking forward to bus rides for several Big East road games instead of long flights and dreadfully late returns to campus from American Athletic Conference trips.

But he couldn't be happier for men's coach Dan Hurley, who's spent his whole life in Big East country.

No sport at UConn will benefit more from the move than men's basketball. It could serve as a springboard for the Huskies to re-emerge on the national scene.

"There's a lot of hopes and dreams resting on Danny's shoulders, but he's more than capable of it," Auriemma said. "He's the right guy at the right time to be making this move. Who knows the league better than him? Who knows the area better than him?

"He's already proven he can coach us up. For me, it's a game changer for the university and our fan base because of what they're going to see on a Thursday night in February when it's snowing and there's 15,000 people at the XL Center because of who we're playing. That, to me, changes everything.

"... This is an exciting new era for UConn men's basketball and I'm excited to see it, quite honestly."

During the interview process for the UConn job in March 2018, Hurley privately wondered if the Huskies would eventually land back in the Big East. But athletic director David Benedict and president Susan Herbst never gave him the impression that anything was in the works.

His mindset was to build a championship-caliber AAC program that will compete in Final Fours and produce NBA draft picks.

Now he just plans on doing it in the Big East.

"My expectations for what I can accomplish here haven't changed," Hurley said. "It's just obviously going to be a lot more exciting in terms of where we fit as a program."

Hurley admits his rebuilding job will be a bit easier from a recruiting standpoint. Already with strong ties in the fertile northeast recruiting grounds, he can sell playing in one of the best college basketball conferences in the country.

He's already received positive feedback from some recruits.

"We recruited at a high level this past year, but now this gives us another jolt...," Hurley said. "The Big East brand combined with the UConn brand, that's a little bit of a game changer for us, because of the fit, the blueprint we have in recruiting, the northeastern corridor resonates with the Big East. Those kids want to play in the Big East. Their families can see them play in the Big East. And they've got a chance to perform on the biggest stage in college basketball.

"When you've got the history and tradition that you have at UConn, the fan base, the passion, the quality university, who wouldn't want to play there now."

Another significant impact will be re-energizing a fan base that has begged for UConn to return to a conference where it has a championship past but has changed since the Huskies went to the AAC in 2013.

The Huskies have suffered through three straight losing seasons but made progress last season despite their 16-17 record.

By the time UConn expects to play its first season in the Big East in 2020, Hurley hopes to have a strong foundation in place.

"We have an exciting young team that we're going to take the floor with next year and we're going to continue to recruit at a high level and develop players at a high level. I just think our third year going into the Big East, it will be a perfect time.

"Our focus right now, we play in a great basketball conference, the American. ... We haven't accounted ourselves very well in this conference. We've got one more year in this league to give a better representation of what UConn basketball is, so we'll focus on that for the next year."

It won't be the same Big East that Hurley played in as a guard at Seton Hall. Or the same one that he used to leave school early as a history teacher at St. Benedict's Prep in Newark to attend the Big East tournament.

It will still be the Big East, and that's all that matters to Hurley.

"The conference back when I played in it, it was war time out there," Hurley said. "But the league is such an exciting uptempo, fast pace, offensive style of play. Villanova's program has been as good as anyone in the country the last several years. The depth of the league is amazing, so it's a great league.

"Obviously, if we do our part at UConn, which we will do, we're going to even enhance if not the best basketball conference in the country, one of the best."

g.keefe@theday.com