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Email Coach Graves: mgraves@butler.edu
Matthew Graves, who helped lead the Bulldogs to back-to-back NCAA Tournament appearances as a player, completed his fifth season as an assistant coach for the Bulldogs. He spent two seasons on the Bulldogs' staff as coordinator of men's basketball operations, handling a variety of administrative duties for the Bulldogs before assuming an assistant coaching post in 2003. As a full-time assistant coach, he has recruiting, scheduling, individual skills instruction, on-court coaching and game preparation responsibilities. Graves also serves on the staff of Butler's summer basketball camps. The former Butler player joined coach Todd Lickliter's staff in 2001-02, after serving assistant basketball coaching stints at both North Central High School and Ben Davis High School in Indianapolis. He was an assistant to former Butler player/coach Doug Mitchell at North Central. Graves was a four-year basketball letterwinner at Butler, 1993-98. He was the third leading scorer for the Bulldogs in 1996-97, while helping Butler to a conference championship and its first NCAA Tournament appearance in 35 years. The following season, he was named Butler's most valuable player, while the Bulldogs repeated as league champion and made a return trip to the national tournament. He led the conference in free throw shooting in 1997-98, and he was named to the league All-Tournament team in 1998, after scoring a team-high 18 points in the league title game. The sharpshooting guard finished his collegiate career in second place (he currently stands fourth) on Butler's all-time list for three-point field goals with 175 and in third place (now fourth) on the Bulldogs' all-time list for free throw shooting with a .846 mark. He scored a career-high 42 points (the fifth-highest single game scoring total in Butler history) against Cleveland State as a senior, and one game later scored 30 points against Detroit. Those two games were the best back-to-back scoring performances by a Butler player in more than a decade! He finished his Butler career with 994 career points. Graves, who was a GTE Academic All-District selection in 1997-98, earned a B.S. degree in education (chemistry) from Butler in 1998. He received his Master's Degree in education administration from Butler in 2003. He and his wife, Susan, have two daughters, Abigail and Lillian. |
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