Kansas basketball coach Bill Self is headed to Connecticut on Friday morning to take part in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame induction ceremony that will feature the late Eddie Sutton.
Self is one of three co-presenters for the legendary coach, a four-time national coach of the year who racked up 806 career victories in a 37 seasons as a college head coach, mostly at Arkansas, Kentucky and Oklahoma State.
Joining Self in presenting Sutton, who died May 23, 2020, will be Kentucky coach John Calipari and former Arkansas and NBA great Sidney Moncrief.
The ceremony will take place Saturday at Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Conn. Sutton is one of nine individuals being inducted into the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame Class of 2020. The presentation was pushed back to 2021 because of the pandemic.
The timing is tight for Self, who remains busy on the recruiting trail and also plans to make it back to town this weekend for KU’s graduation ceremonies, which will feature Marcus Garrett, David McCormack, Mitch Lightfoot, Chris Teahan, Silvio De Sousa and Keith Langford.
But Self, who went into the Hall in 2017, said Thursday that he would not miss the induction for anything.
“With everything going on, I would not be going if it wasn’t for coach Sutton,” Self said in a phone interview with the Journal-World. “But just to be able to be out there with that situation and the ceremonies for that particular class, it’s going to make it pretty special to be there.”
Generally speaking, those presenting the Hall of Fame inductees do not speak at the ceremony. But given the fact that Sutton himself will not be present, Self said he thought the trio presenting him would carry the moment.
Unlike with his own speech four years ago, Self said there were no nerves associated with this Hall of Fame experience.
“Most of my talking may have already been done by video,” he said.
Joining Sutton in the 2020 class are: longtime FIBA executive **Patrick Baumann**, 18-time NBA All-Star and five-time NBA champion **Kobe Bryant**, 10-time WNBA All-Star and four-time Olympic gold medalist **Tamika Catchings**, 15-time NBA All-Star and three-time NBA Finals MVP **Tim Duncan**, 15-time NBA All-Star and nine-time NBA All-Defensive First Team selection **Kevin Garnett**, three-time NCAA National Championship coach **Kim Mulkey**, five-time Division II National Coach of the Year **Barbara Stevens** and two-time NBA Cham-pion coach **Rudy Tomjanovich**.
NBA legend Michael Jordan is scheduled to present Bryant, who died in a helicopter crash in January of 2020.
“That could be great,” Self said. “I’m excited about it.”
