Mike DiMauro: Is there anybody in charge of Dan Hurley at UConn?

Feb. 23—Winning is the great deodorant, faithfully freshening all that pungency that would otherwise be more odious and obvious with a different outcome.

In that spirit, all hail Dan Hurley, the conquering hero. He's winning. Enough said. The Huskies are back, baby, with the only caveat that more applications of the metaphorical deodorant are required.

Technical fouls? Ejections? League reprimands? Baiting fans? Nothing to see here. Move along, move along, move along.

Except that I have a question: Who is in charge during men's basketball games now at UConn? Is there anyone in charge of Hurley? Is there anyone in charge period? Tuesday night's E.D.J. (Ejection Du Jour) came on the heels of Saturday's follies, during which a game official tossed former UConn player James Bouknight from his front row seat. And yet security personnel couldn't find the mettle to remove Bouknight from the premises. He watched the rest of the game from the student section.

Again, I ask: Who's in charge here? Is winning that much of an obsession now at State U that volatile behavior has been minimized, if not totally dismissed?

I'm not talking about fans. Most fans aren't rational. I'm certainly not with the teams I root for. If it helps my team win: It's good. If it contributes to my team's loss: It's bad. UConn fans, for example, have all but excused the acts themselves, preferring to blame the officials for tossing Bouknight and Hurley. It is their prerogative. Their blathering and bloviating on and off social media is half the fun of being a fan. It's also irrelevant.

But what of university administrators — athletic and otherwise — who bear some responsibility to UConn's overall reputation? Is anybody at UConn ever going to stand up and demand better behavior from Hurley? This just in: Dignity can still accompany winning. Exhibit A would be Wright, Jay.

In recent weeks, Hurley went after a fan at Butler, challenged some fans who were heckling him after the Creighton game, sought out the same fans (unprovoked) before the Marquette game, got reprimanded by the Big East for postgame remarks about officiating after the Xavier game and got ejected Tuesday night in the biggest game of the season.

Does anyone else see a pattern here?

It would be easier to accuse official James Breeding of being thin-skinned if Tuesday's incident was isolated. But Hurley can't control himself. And his superiors at the university — if he has any — have adopted the Sgt. Schultz act.

Again: The fans are free to absolve Hurley and attack Breeding. But there was way more context hovering in the XL Center Tuesday night.

Don't think the officials weren't aware of 1) Bouknight's "ejection" from Saturday in which he simply moved sections, leading them to wonder whether security at UConn games is toothless; 2) the recent volatility of college basketball in general, evidenced by the Juwan Howard/Greg Gard foibles; and 3) the explosive nature of the UConn/Nova game with the need to keep as much order as possible amid a ravenous crowd.

So is it really a surprise that given the context, Breeding got annoyed when Hurley reacted to a technical foul by inciting the crowd? Sure, I'd have preferred Breeding, understanding the significance of the game, walk over to Hurley and warn him. But Breeding is human and Hurley is gaining a reputation of petulance and peevishness that won't get him the benefit of many future doubts.

And that is only going to hurt UConn.

Sure, the administration can lapse into victimhood. Seems all the rage now. Or its members can take Hurley aside, thank him for filling the buildings again and then remind him to err on the side of decaf.

No other coach on campus acts this way. And many of them are far more accomplished than Hurley.

UConn is no different than every other institution in America right now in that image trumps all. Its fans see an image enhanced by the men's basketball program recalling the old days. The rest of us see unnecessary — and worse — unchecked volatility that's a bad look, regardless of what the scoreboard says.

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro