Three months later, it’s doubtful Erick Harper has had many good nights of sleep.

The UNLV athletic director has conducted coaching searches in his two main sports. One instance was decided for him; the other, he made the call.

Barry Odom left as football coach for Purdue, meaning Harper would seek a national search for someone who could continue the winning ways Odom had created over two seasons.

It was hardly a surprise, given the communication Harper had with Odom. The coach was a hot name in college circles given what he had accomplished at UNLV. It was a certainty others would come calling with large offers. Purdue won that battle with a reported six-year, $39 million deal.

Harper would then decide on Dan Mullen, the former Florida and Mississippi State coach, to replace Odom. The one who would inherit a program that had qualified for its second consecutive bowl game for the first time in school history.

Firing Kruger

Harper then made a major move. He fired men’s basketball coach Kevin Kruger in March following the Mountain West tournament, letting go of a coach whose team had not made the NCAA Tournament in his four years leading the program.

“Any time you part ways with a coach, it’s a difficult decision,” Harper said. “Any person who tells you it’s not difficult is lying. A decision like that has implications on assistants, on support staff, on a multitude of individuals. But you have to make decisions based on what is best for your department and university.”

The decision came three years after Harper extended Kruger’s contract by one year following an 18-14 season.

“I did think things were moving in the right direction,” Harper said. “It was his first year, and you saw a lot of positivity there with Kevin as a first-time head coach.”

Kruger was afforded a $2.35 million buyout, which surprisingly exceeded the two years and $1.6 million that remained on his contract when he was fired.

Harper didn’t negotiate the original contract or the buyout. That was done by then-athletic director Desiree Reed-Francois.

Attempts to reach Reed-Francois, now the athletic director at Arizona, were unsuccessful.

Harper would hire former Memphis and Georgia Tech coach Josh Pastner as Kruger’s replacement. It was an exhaustive search that saw Harper receive calls and recommendations from all levels of basketball — from the people he knows in the industry to the college landscape to search firms to the NBA and to Hall of Fame coaches.

“The amount of people who have my number where I don’t know how they got my number is astonishing,” Harper said. “Some of the (recommendations) made sense, and some didn’t make sense. I had no less than 75 recommendations.”

The timing of both hires was critical, but things move faster in the basketball world given how the transfer portal opens immediately following conference tournaments. Harper, however, was relatively quick in naming both coaches.

“Football is a little different because you might have coaches preparing for bowl games, and the timing is spaced out to where you can have those conversations,” he said. “With basketball, you’re navigating the first week of travel for the NCAA Tournament and NIT. There’s a lot less free time for calls.”

Here’s some things about Mullen and Pastner that excited Harper the most: They connect well with others, with people in the community and on campus. They’re open and outgoing and engaging. Others gravitate toward them.

They are important traits in this universe of name, image and likeness.

“Everybody around the country understands the importance of NIL and to move forward and be competitive in that space,” Harper said.

Important hires

Three months later, Harper has made two of the most important hires in his tenure since replacing Reed-Francois in January 2022.

Not a lot of sleep.

“At the end of the day, Las Vegas is the sports and entertainment capital of the world,” Harper said. “It’s a destination place. The things that have gone on here the last several years with the excitement in sports, people want to be around that type of atmosphere and culture. They want to be around an infectious level of success to build their own programs and culture in this city.”

Now, it’s on Mullen and Pastner to do so.

Contact Ed Graney at [email protected]. Follow @edgraney on X.