APOPKA, Fla. — For nearly 50 years Earl Graham was a youth basketball coach. It wasn’t the wins and losses he cared about most, it was his players.

What You Need To Know

  • Apopka High School assistant basketball coach Earl Graham died of the coronavirue

  • He was also a 25-year veteran of the Orlando Fire Department

  • His family said the 72-year-old had never met a stranger in his life

“Making an impact on a young man's life,” Graham's son, JayRaj said. “It was just something that just meant a lot to him.”

In December, the man who loved to coach caught the coronavirus. 

The virus didn't just sideline his basketball season at Apopka High, but according to his family, it ultimately took his life.

“It hurt,” JayRaj said. “Especially with everything going on, you don’t want to think that maybe we could have done things differently or done something about this earlier, and we wouldn’t be at this point.”

Not only did the man with a smile from ear to ear help boys on the court, he helped everyday citizens off the court while working for the Orlando Fire Department for more than 25 years.

“See him coming down the pole, putting his stuff on, and getting on that truck and leaving that was pretty exciting,” Graham's other son Roderick said with a smile. “But you knew that was something good if they were leaving also.”

A grandfather, a father, a fire fighter, a coach, a regular. No one in Earl’s life was a stranger.

“He never met a stranger in his life,” JayRaj said. “We would be at the grocery store sometimes, and he will wait in line and he will look behind him and just start talking to the person.”

Before Earl caught the coronavirus while he was doing what he loved: coaching basketball as an assistant coach at Apopka High. His schedule is stuck to the fridge to this day, with his handwriting on the schedule showing he went out a winner. 

Earl Graham over the years coached hundreds of kids who went off to play college basketball, but he did coach a pair with ties to the NBA. Vince Carter, and Austin Rivers.

Earl Graham was 72 years old.