Dave Odom

Dave Odom got his start in big time college basketball as a player at Guilford College from 1961 to 1965. While attending Guilford he was a three-year starter at quarterback on the football team and also started all-four years on the basketball team. During his senior year he was named the college’s most outstanding athlete, and would go on to be inducted into the Guilford College Athletics Hall of Fame in 1983. Upon earning his degree from Guilford he signed on as the head coach at Goldsboro High School and enrolled at East Carolina University, where he earned his masters degree in Physical Education. In 1969 he was hired as the head coach at Durham High School, where he earned five-league coach of the year honors from 1969 to 1976. After the 1976 season he made the jump back to college as an assistant at Wake Forest University. After three seasons with the Demon Deacons he landed the head-coaching job at East Carolina, where he remained until signing on as an assistant coach at Virginia from 1982 to 1989. Coach Odom would end up coaching the Demon Deacons of Wake Forest from 1989 to 2001, where he led them to two ACC Tournament titles and an ACC Regular Season Championship in 1995 while also being named ACC Coach of the Year in 1991, 1994 and 1995. From 2001 to 2008 he served as the head coach at the University of South Carolina, where he led the Gamecocks to two NIT Tournament titles in 2005 and 2006 and earned SEC Coach of the Year honors in 2004.