COACHING CONNECTION
Healthy Living | Winter Issue | 2017–2018 9
Bill Worrell and Mindy Odom
know plenty about basketball
coaching success in the Upper
Cumberland.
Worrell spent 20 years as
head coach for the Tennessee
Tech women, piling up 408
wins while winning close to 70
percent of his games. He also
tallied 12 regular-season Ohio
Valley Conference titles and
eight NCAA tournament appearances
for the Golden Eaglettes.
Odom, meanwhile, finished
with 538 total wins on
the high school sidelines, and
advanced to three state tournaments,
including two for
Cookeville High School and
another for Cannon County
High School.
Longtime Connection
Not only did Worrell and
Odom have front-row seats to
each other’s careers, they also
share a longtime connection
on the court. That’s because
Odom was a player for the
Golden Eaglettes in the early
1980s during Worrell’s time
as an assistant for Marynell
Meadors. And after spending
some time at Harpeth High
School, Odom returned to
Cookeville and served as an assistant
for Worrell for four years
after he took the reins of the
program.
Worrell said he could tell
even during Odom’s playing
days, she had what it took to
make the transition to coaching.
“What I noticed was Mindy
was a student of the game
even when she played,” Worrell
recalled. “When I got the head
job, I called her up and she said,
‘What do you want me for?’ I
said, ‘Because you have a good
basketball brain, I like you and
I think we could work well together.’
She was working down
at Harpeth, and it worked out
well. She came back, and she
was a big factor. She was really
fun to work with, and she was
intelligent.”
Odom said her time as
an assistant for the Golden
By Craig Delk
Photo Provided By Tennessee Technological
Univesity.