Fran Dunphy earns his 600th win as La Salle blasts Coppin State. Up next? A trip back to Temple.

Anwar Gill has played under La Salle coach Fran Dunphy for only 40 games, but he knows Dunphy well enough to know that he isn’t big on self-promotion, especially not after a milestone win.

“He doesn’t like hearing this, but he’s one of the greatest coaches in Philly history and one of the greatest coaches in world history,” Gill said.

The Philly part? That’s been established. No coach has more wins coaching a Big 5 team than Dunphy. He padded his lead with a nice, round number Sunday, earning win No. 600 Sunday afternoon at Tom Gola Arena in an 81-62 La Salle victory over Coppin State.

Dunphy was sitting next to Gill, who finished with a game-high 19 points and nine rebounds, as the player showered him with praise. Dunphy, the 43rd Division I men’s coach to reach 600 wins, sipped on a water bottle and accepted the praise — maybe a bit reluctantly.

When Gill left the room and it was time for Dunphy’s portion of the postgame press conference, the 75-year-old confirmed the obvious: He’s not big on milestones.

“I’ve been in coaching a lot of years,” said Dunphy, whose 945-game career started at Penn in 1989. “I’m appreciative of the guys that have played for me, the guys that have coached with me.”

His mind, he said, was on La Salle’s next game — Wednesday night at Temple. It’s a big one, for a few reasons. Any coach, Dunphy included, would say it’s the biggest game because it’s the next game. There’s also the fact that it’s essentially a Big 5 Classic semifinal, with the winner moving on to Saturday’s championship. Then comes the obvious Dunphy connection. He coached on North Broad for 13 seasons (2006-19), and this will be his first trip back as La Salle’s coach.

“It’s hard,” Dunphy said. “I spent all those years at Penn. I spent all those years at Temple. When you play them, it’s not easy.

“It wears on you, I’ll be honest with you. I will think about that a little bit. But as soon as the ball goes up, I’m thinking about our guys playing as well as they can.”

The breakdown for Dunphy’s wins looks like this: 310 at Penn; 270 at Temple; and 20 at La Salle, his alma mater. Dunphy on Sunday became the 11th active coach to join the 600 club. Longtime Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski is the all-time wins leader with 1,202. St. John’s coach Rick Pitino moved ahead of John Calipari to the top of the active wins leaderboard with win No. 838 Saturday.

Jay Wright (642) may have more wins than Dunphy as far as Big 5 legends go, but only 520 of those wins were while coaching Villanova. The late John Chaney finished his Temple career with 516 wins.

» READ MORE: Fran O’Hanlon, longtime Daily News writers highlight latest Big 5 Hall of Fame class

No. 600 for Dunphy eventually came easy. His Explorers were 20-point favorites against winless Coppin State. But it still required some coaching. La Salle started slow, and a 9-0 Coppin State run that featured five La Salle turnovers had the game tied through 12 minutes.

After a timeout, La Salle finally got rolling. The Explorers led 34-27 at halftime and then used a 20-10 run in the first eight minutes of the second half to put the game out of reach. But even with La Salle ahead by 25, there was still coaching to do. Andrés Marrero turned the ball over with more than six minutes remaining. Dunphy jumped up and down, clapping his hands and yelling in frustration.

Then the Dunphy Scowl formed on his face.

Gill knows that one well. But he knows the coaching works, too.

Dunphy, Gill said, has been adamant about the senior guard improving his rebounding. Four of his nine Sunday came on the offensive end. When the postgame media availability began, Dunphy was asked to make an opening statement. He instead asked Gill how he played.

“I thought I did pretty well,” Gill said. “I crashed the offensive glass like you’ve been asking me to for the past two years.”

“Yeah, thank you very much for that,” Dunphy replied. “How about your defense?”

“It has to improve for us to be a great team,” Gill said.

“Yes, indeed,” Dunphy said.

La Salle might not be great yet, but the Explorers (5-1) certainly don’t look like a team that deserved to be picked 15th in the 15-team Atlantic 10 Conference. They started 4-0 for the first time in nine years and their only blemish is a loss at No. 9 Duke last week. There’s a reason Dunphy won Big 5 Coach of the Year last year in guiding La Salle to an unexpected 15 wins.

No, Dunphy isn’t interested in talking milestones and awards, but hearing the words of praise from guys like Gill?

» READ MORE: Duke makes Fran Dunphy wait a little longer to amass his 600th win in a rout of his Explorers

“I’ve coached so many guys in my lifetime. ... He’s a great guy,” Dunphy said. “I love coaching him. I love fussing at him, too, when he puts his head down and gets in a different neighborhood.”

It’s been Dunphy’s life for 35 years, this fussing and coaching — almost to the day. His first win came Nov. 25, 1989. It was at the Palestra against Lehigh, which was coached by Dave Duke, who would go on to serve on Dunphy’s staffs at Penn and Temple. Perhaps that connection is the only reason Dunphy remembered it, because the score of the game didn’t come to mind when he was asked.

Penn 69, Lehigh 64, Dunphy was told.

“What am I going to do with that?” he said.