Naismith Hall mulls date for Sutton, Class of 2020 induction

Former Arkansas basketball coach Eddie Sutton, center, talks with former players Joe Kleine, left, and Darrel Walker, right, during a game between Arkansas and Kentucky on Thursday, Jan. 21, 2016, at Bud Walton Arena in Fayetteville.

Eddie Sutton's long-awaited induction into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame will have to wait a little longer.

Because of the coronavirus outbreak, the induction ceremony, which will posthumously honor Sutton along with Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant, is being postponed either to October or the spring. The induction weekend was originally set for Aug. 28-30 in Springfield, Mass.

Sutton, who brought Arkansas basketball to national prominence in 11 seasons and led the Razorbacks to a 260-75 record, including a 120-8 record in Barnhill Arena, was a finalist for the Naismith Hall of Fame six times before he was elected April 3.

Sutton won 806 career games in 37 seasons as a Division I head coach at Creighton, Arkansas, Kentucky, Oklahoma State and San Francisco. His teams won eight regular-season conference championships — including five Southwest Conference titles at Arkansas — and played in the postseason 26 times.

He led the Razorbacks to the Final Four in 1978 when he was named national coach of the year by The Associated Press for the first of two times. He also led Oklahoma State to Final Fours in 1995 and 2004.

Sutton died May 23 in Tulsa at the age of 84.

"All of these things are going to happen. It's just a matter of the timing's going to be delayed," Naismith Hall of Fame president and CEO John Doleva said Tuesday in an interview with The AP.

"We will have the most remarkable class ever when that happens. We didn't plan it this way and it's not the way we would have chosen to do it," he said. "But we're fortunate that our plans were able to remain in place, even though the timing has changed."

The Hall of Fame is hoping to announce a new induction date by mid-June. At least one thing will be different for this year's ceremony: The Hall will "break protocol a little bit" and allow family members to speak on behalf of honorees who are being inducted posthumously. Previously, they were presented only on video.

Doleva said the exception will be made not just for Bryant, who died in a helicopter crash on Jan. 26, but also for Sutton and former FIBA Secretary General Patrick Baumann, who died in 2018.

Although Bryant, a five-time NBA champion who is No. 4 on the NBA's all-time scoring list, was already the biggest star in this year's class, his death at the age of 41 guaranteed that his induction would dominate this year's ceremony. Doleva said the Hall decided against inducting Bryant alone and gave no thought to having a separate ceremony for him.

"It's not going to be all about Kobe," he said. "What I've found is that these classes bond together. ... And I'm hoping that that's what this class will do with Kobe and his family and Eddie Sutton and his family and those that are still living, they will have that bond.

"It may be a little heavily weighted toward Kobe, frankly, and that's for obvious reasons. But it will be a memorable ceremony and we're going to celebrate everybody equally in terms of their accomplishments. They're all Hall of Famers, and all Hall of Famers are equal in the eyes of the museum."

The Hall's Class of 2020 includes Bryant, Kevin Garnett, Tim Duncan and WNBA star Tamika Catchings, who were all elected in their first year of eligibility. Also to be honored are Sutton and fellow coaches Rudy Tomjanovich, Kim Mulkey and Barbara Stevens, along Baumann.

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.