Joey Graham on What Makes Eddie Sutton a Hall of Fame Coach To Him

We had former Oklahoma State star Joey Graham on our podcast on Friday, and he cast his ballot for Eddie Sutton as a hall-of-famer based on his up-close experience over the course of three years (one as a transfer in 2003 and two playing in 2004-05).

“Every guy on our team had a story,” he said as we discussed Tony Allen and JamesOn Curry. “I don’t know if those are the type of guys he was looking for, but he was able to jell guys from different walks of life, different areas, environments and circumstances and put them together and get the best out of them. If that’s not what a hall of fame coach is, then I don’t know.

“How many coaches can you say have done that?”

Not many.

While it’s true that those 2004-2005 teams were loaded with NBA talent — both squads had five future pros — it’s also true that those are sometimes the most difficult to coach and to figure out if you’re the head man.

“That just goes to show what type of coach he was,” said Graham. “We had tons of talent, tons of different guys, and he was able to bring all of us together and fall in line. The game plan — defense, defense, defense — every single person on that team … knew that’s what it was. You were going to play defense, you were going to play hard and you were going to compete. Every day.”

Those rosters were certainly a mishmash of studs. From Frans Steyn to Aaron Pettway to Daniel Bobik to JamesOn, Sutton did an unbelievable job of moving everybody in the same direction and getting 57 wins out of them over the course of Graham’s two years of play. He tied in a third year (his redshirt year in 2003).

“I would say the three years I was there could have easily been three national championships,” said Graham. We had that type of talent and that type of coach and staff.”

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