Robert Ryan Odom (born July 11, 1974) is an American men's

college basketball In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...

coach who is currently the head coach of the

VCU Rams The VCU Rams are the athletic teams of Virginia Commonwealth University of Richmond, Virginia, United States. The Rams compete in Division I of the National Collegiate Athletic Association as members of the Atlantic 10 Conference. The most succe ...

men's basketball team. He was previously the head coach of the

Lenoir–Rhyne Bears The Lenoir–Rhyne Bears are the athletic teams that represent Lenoir–Rhyne University, located in Hickory, North Carolina, in intercollegiate sports at the Division II level of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). The Bears h ...

, the

UMBC Retrievers The UMBC Retrievers are the athletic teams that represent the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, located in Catonsville, Maryland, in intercollegiate athletics as a member of the Division I level of the National Collegiate Athletic Associ ...

, and the

Utah State Aggies The Utah State Aggies are the intercollegiate athletic teams that represent Utah State University, located in Logan. The school fields 16 sports teams – seven men and nine women – and compete in the Mountain West Conference. Sports spon ...

. Odom served as the interim head coach of the

Charlotte 49ers men's basketball The Charlotte 49ers men's basketball team represents the University of North Carolina at Charlotte (UNC Charlotte) in NCAA Division I basketball. The 49ers are charter members of Conference USA. Charlotte returned to C-USA in 2013 after leaving i ...

team from January 6 until March 15, 2015. In this capacity, he replaced Alan Major when Major went on a medical leave of absence to deal with chronic health issues. After one season as head coach at Lenoir–Rhyne, Odom was head coach at

UMBC The University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) is a public research university in Baltimore County, Maryland. It has a fall 2022 enrollment of 13,991 students, 61 undergraduate majors, over 92 graduate programs (38 master, 25 doctoral, ...

from 2016 to 2021. In the 2018 NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Tournament, UMBC upset no. 1 seed

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

and became the first no. 16 seed to beat a no. 1 seed in NCAA Division I men's tournament history. In 2021, Odom became head coach at Utah State.

Playing career

Odom graduated from Richard J. Reynolds High School in

Winston-Salem, North Carolina Winston-Salem is a city and the county seat of Forsyth County, North Carolina, United States. In the 2020 census, the population was 249,545, making it the second-largest municipality in the Piedmont Triad region, the 5th most populous city in ...

, in 1992 and enrolled at Hampden–Sydney College out of high school. Odom was a four-year starting point guard for the

Hampden–Sydney Tigers The Hampden–Sydney Tigers are the athletic teams that represent Hampden–Sydney College, located in Hampden Sydney, Virginia, in NCAA Division III intercollegiate sports. The Tigers compete as members of the Old Dominion Athletic Conference fo ...

under head coach Tony Shaver, serving as team captain his senior year. He left the Tigers ranking the school's all-time leader in three-point field goals, and fourth in assists. Odom graduated from Hampden–Sydney in 1996 with a degree in economics.

Coaching career

Odom began his coaching career as a graduate assistant at South Florida. He also had stops as an assistant coach with Furman, UNC Asheville, and American, before spending seven years on

Seth Greenberg Seth Vincent Greenberg (born April 18, 1956) is an American college basketball broadcaster who works as an analyst for ESPN. Prior to taking the position at ESPN he was a coach for 34 years, the last 22 as a head coach. Greenberg has been the he ...

's staff at Virginia Tech. In 2010, he joined the coaching staff of Charlotte, serving as an assistant for five years, including being interim head coach. Odom was relieved of his coaching duties on March 16, 2015 when Major and the university mutually agreed to part ways, and his staff was not retained. Odom compiled an overall record of 8–11 as Charlotte's interim coach. After Charlotte, Odom accepted the job at Lenoir-Rhyne, leading the Bears to the Quarterfinals of the NCAA Division II tournament in his only season at the helm, before accepting the head coaching position at Division I UMBC, replacing Aki Thomas.

UMBC

In his first season at the helm of the Retrievers, Odom orchestrated a 14-win improvement over the team's 7–25 season the previous year to a 21–13 overall record, and fifth-place finish in the

America East Conference The America East Conference is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with NCAA Division I founded in 1979, whose members are located in the Northeastern United States. The conference has nine core members including eight public research ...

. The 21 wins are second-most in school history. For its efforts, UMBC accepted a bid to the 2017 CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament, where it won its first round matchup against Fairfield for the first postseason win in program history. From there the Retrievers defeated St. Francis (PA) in the second round and advanced past

Liberty Liberty is the ability to do as one pleases, or a right or immunity enjoyed by prescription or by grant (i.e. privilege). It is a synonym for the word freedom. In modern politics, liberty is understood as the state of being free within society fr ...

in the CIT quarterfinals before falling to Texas A&M–Corpus Christi in the semifinals. The 2017–18 regular season saw the Retrievers finish in second place in the America East, with a 12–4 record, and earning the conference's automatic berth into the NCAA Tournament when it knocked off Vermont 65–62 in the

2018 America East men's basketball tournament The 2018 America East men's basketball tournament was the postseason men's basketball tournament for the America East Conference, which was held on March 3, 6, and 10, 2018. All tournament games were played on home arenas of the higher-seeded sch ...

final, earning its second-ever NCAA Tournament appearance. During the 2018 NCAA tournament, the Retrievers became the first #16 men's seed ever to defeat a #1 seed in the first round with a 74–54 victory over

. After the historic win, the Retrievers lost in the second round to

Kansas State Kansas State University (KSU, Kansas State, or K-State) is a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Manhattan, Kansas, United States. It was opened as the state's land-grant college in 1863 and was the first public instit ...

, 50–43. The following season, Odom led the Retrievers to another 20-win season and another appearance in the 2019 America East tournament final, where it fell to Vermont. In his final year at UMBC, Odom guided the Retrievers to a share of the America East regular season crown for the first time since 2008.

Utah State

On April 5, 2021, Odom was announced as the head coach at Utah State.

Personal life

Odom was born in Durham, North Carolina. The son of former

East Carolina East Carolina University (ECU) is a public research university in Greenville, North Carolina. It is the fourth largest university in North Carolina. Founded on March 8, 1907, as a teacher training school, East Carolina has grown from its orig ...

, Wake Forest, and

South Carolina )'' Animis opibusque parati'' ( for, , Latin, Prepared in mind and resources, links=no) , anthem = " Carolina";" South Carolina On My Mind" , Former = Province of South Carolina , seat = Columbia , LargestCity = Charleston , LargestMetro = ...

head coach

Dave Odom George David Odom (born October 9, 1942) is a retired American men's college basketball coach. He served as the head coach of the East Carolina Pirates, Wake Forest Demon Deacons and South Carolina Gamecocks. Playing career Odom began his caree ...

, he is married and has two children. His son Connor, who played for him at Utah State, was one of two recipients of the United States Basketball Writers Association's Perry Wallace Most Courageous Award in 2023. Connor received the award for his advocacy on mental health issues after going public with his own struggles with

anxiety Anxiety is an emotion which is characterized by an unpleasant state of inner turmoil and includes feelings of dread over anticipated events. Anxiety is different than fear in that the former is defined as the anticipation of a future threat wh ...

and

obsessive–compulsive disorder Obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) is a mental and behavioral disorder in which an individual has intrusive thoughts and/or feels the need to perform certain routines repeatedly to the extent where it induces distress or impairs general ...

following a teenage bout with

Lyme disease Lyme disease, also known as Lyme borreliosis, is a vector-borne disease caused by the ''Borrelia'' bacterium, which is spread by ticks in the genus ''Ixodes''. The most common sign of infection is an expanding red rash, known as erythema migran ...

. He shared the award with Saint Louis' Terrence Hargrove, another player who openly discussed his own mental health issues.

Head coaching record

*''Charlotte head coach Alan Major took an indefinite leave of absence due to medical reasons on January 6, 2015. Charlotte's record at the time was 6–7 (0–1 C-USA).''

Footnotes

References