NEW YORK, New York -- Kyle O’Quinn’s smile was gone. So was his booming laugh. The gregarious kid Campus Magnet coach Charles Granby likened to the TNT version of Charles Barkley was tired of losing and decided the best way to change began in practice, by getting serious.
“It was either then or never,” he recalled. “I wanted a different outcome.”
At the time, midway through O'Quinn's junior season, Norfolk State was in the midst of an 11-game losing streak. One practice O’Quinn didn’t say a word, a rarity for the talkative forward. Over the next three weeks, he didn’t joke at all during practice. The team won six of its next seven games, with O’Quinn leading the way, went on to win the MEAC this winter and upset Missouri in the NCAA Tournament.
“When he came with a business-like attitude, everything changed for him and for us,” Norfolk State coach Anthony Evans said. It was the start of his metamorphosis, a turning point in his career, O’Quinn said. On Thursday, the 6-foot-10 O’Quinn is expected to be selected in the NBA Draft, taken anywhere from late in the first round to early in the second, his agent Albert Ebanks said.
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