updated 3:25 p.m. ET Feb. 24, 2006

STILLWATER, Okla. - Oklahoma State basketball coach Eddie Sutton underwent successful surgery Thursday morning that his doctor said should help address the coach’s chronic hip and back problems.

Surgeon James Rodgers said earlier this week that he would perform a lumbar spinal decompression on Sutton, which would create more room for the nerves in the 69-year-old coach’s back.

Rodgers said the surgery went as planned. Sutton is “recovering comfortably” from the procedure and should be discharged from the hospital in the next two days to continue his recovery at home, Rodgers said in a statement released by the university.

Rodgers said Sutton should be able to begin physical therapy in 10 to 12 days.

“Then we will monitor his progress to determine when it would be appropriate for him to enter a treatment center” for alcoholism, Rodgers said.

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Sutton was hospitalized after suffering injuries in an automobile accident on Feb. 10 and took a medical leave of absence two days later. On Feb. 15, Sutton — who underwent treatment for alcoholism in 1987, when he was the coach at Kentucky — acknowledged drinking alcohol before the accident and said he would be entering a treatment center.

Last Friday, he was charged with misdemeanor aggravated drunk driving, speeding and driving left of center. A court affidavit showed Sutton’s blood-alcohol level tested at .22, or nearly three times the legal limit in Oklahoma.

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Sutton cracked bones in his lower back when he was bumped and fell on an airport escalator in Los Angeles in July 2004. Two months later, he cracked his tailbone in five places when he jumped into a ditch to avoid being hit by a vehicle.

Rodgers said Sutton has been treated with medicine and lumbar epidural steroid injections for the past year in an effort to avoid a surgical correction to lumbar degenerative disc disease that causes pain to radiate from Sutton’s back into his hips.

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