Crawford Excited For New Challenge With Odom

By Jeff White (jwhite@virginia.edu)
VirginiaSports.com

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — He’s an Ohio native and a Buckeye through and through, and Bryce Crawford never dreamed he’d live in Utah, let alone see one of his children born there. But when Ryan Odom left UMBC in 2021 to become head men’s basketball coach at Utah State, Crawford didn’t hesitate to follow him west.

That’s how much he believes in Odom, with whom Crawford first worked at UNC Charlotte in 2011.

“The guy got me to go to Utah,” Crawford recalled with a laugh. “There’s nothing wrong with that, but it was totally outside of my realm, my familiar geography, to do something like that. But he keeps giving me opportunities, which is really, really cool. I’m very grateful for that.”

After two seasons as an assistant coach on Odom’s staff in Logan, Utah, Crawford went east with him to Richmond, where Odom took over as VCU’s head coach in 2023. Two years later, Odom has taken on a new challenge, this time at the University of Virginia, and Crawford remains by his side.

“He’s really grown as an assistant coach over the years,” Odom said in his John Paul Jones Arena office. “I’ve been very fortunate to have him with me that long. He’s really grown within our program. When I first started with him, he wasn’t married. Now he’s married and has three kids and has become a dynamite communicator and coach.”

Odom brought seven of his VCU staffers with him to UVA: Crawford, Matt Henry, Matt Hart, Billy Bales, Darius Theus, Ahmad Thomas and Kelsey Knoche. Two others who have joined Odom at JPJ—associate head coach Griff Aldrich and director of culture and alumni engagement Michael Crowder—were at Longwood last season.

Aldrich and Odom were teammates at Hampden-Sydney College. Bales and Crawford don’t go back that far with Odom, but they were him at Division II Lenoir-Rhyne in Hickory, N.C. Bales played for Lenoir-Rhyne, and Crawford was one of Odom’s assistants there.

That was Crawford’s first full-time coaching job. Born and raised in Columbus, he’d played basketball at Pickerington Central High School, and even then Crawford knew he wanted to coach.

At Ohio State, from which he graduated in 2011, Crawford was a men’s basketball manager for four years. He wasn’t good enough to play for the Buckeyes, who had such standouts as Jared Sullinger, Aaron Craft, Will Buford, David Lighty and Evan Turner during Crawford’s time on campus, but he received an exceptional basketball education.

“I was blessed,” Crawford said. “The staffs that I worked with at Ohio State were unbelievable. Let’s say there were 10 assistant coaches over the course of my time there. All of them were a head coach before or got a head coaching job after.”

Those assistants included Dave Dickerson, Brandon Miller, Archie Miller, Jeff Boals, John Groce, Dan Peters and Alan Major. “I’m sitting there just learning from these guys every day,” Crawford said.

Charlotte hired Major as its head coach after the 2009-10 season. A year later, Crawford joined the 49ers’ staff as a graduate manager, “and that’s where I met Coach Odom,” he said.

Crawford made a good impression on his future boss.

“Bryce is one of those guys when you first meet him the energy is evident. The personality is there,” Odom said. “He’s just a very genuine person, a happy person. Bryce doesn’t have many bad days. At least he doesn’t let you know it. He’s a positive person.”

Odom spent four-plus seasons as a Charlotte assistant before serving as interim head coach when Major went on medical leave. Odom left after the 2014-15 season to become head coach at Lenoir-Rhyne.

After receiving a master’s degree from Charlotte in 2013, Crawford had moved to the University of Texas, where he spent two seasons as assistant video coordinator and technical assistant for the men’s basketball program. He learned a lot under Rick Barnes, then the Longhorns’ head coach, but Crawford wanted to be on the court full time.

“I had been in all these support roles,” he said, “and I was like, ‘Man, I don’t want to do that anymore. I want to coach, and I want to teach.’ ”

And so when Odom offered him a job as an assistant coach at Lenoir-Rhyne, Crawford jumped at the opportunity.

“It wasn’t for the money, but it was so much fun,” he said. “We won big—we went to the [Division II] Sweet Sixteen—and it just fun to watch those guys grow and develop throughout the year.”

Most college basketball coaches first played at that level, but that hole in Crawford’s résumé didn’t concern Odom.

“No reservations from that perspective,” Odom said. “I’d seen him on the court. He was a GA for us [at Charlotte]. He was out there with our players a lot, and just being around him, the quality of his work was evident. Off the court, his ability within the office too. You have to be well-rounded in this business. Things are moving really fast. You have to be computer-savvy. You’ve got to be able to communicate effectively with your players. You’ve got to be able to communicate the vision that the head coach and staff have for the team. You have to believe in the core values and the culture that’s trying to be established. Bryce has been tremendous all along the way.”

Not long after Crawford started at Lenoir-Rhyne, then-Ohio State head coach Thad Matta offered him a non-coaching position on the Buckeyes’ staff. Crawford’s parents and other relatives were back in Columbus, but he opted to stay in Hickory.

“You hear people say people are born to coach,” Odom said. “I think Bryce was born to mentor and help kids. He was really excited about the opportunity at Lenoir-Rhyne because it was different than what he’d been doing, and I think he knew if he had gone back to Ohio State or any place at that level it would have been a little bit more of the same of what he had been doing.

“And so he was ready to test himself and get out on the court and be a part of game-planning and recruiting and all the things that you have to do to be successful in this business and to grow. And I think he was comfortable with me at that point. We’d been around one another and he was just starting out with his wife and they had just gotten married and he decided to do something that a lot of folks probably wouldn’t do, and that’s pass up the opportunity to be at the Power Five level and to coach at D-II.”

Crawford and his wife, the former Hallie Kloots, met in a Spanish class at Ohio State. (She’s from Canton, Ohio, home of the Pro Football Hall of Fame.) They have two daughters—Rian, 8, and Devyn, 5—and son Keo, 3.

Until he moved to Richmond, Crawford knew little about this state, and he’s still learning. But he’s enjoying Charlottesville, especially its food scene. “I’ve had plenty of Bodo’s bagels,” Crawford said, laughing.

As someone who grew up in Big Ten country, Crawford said, he’s not as familiar with the ACC as many of his colleagues at JPJ, including Odom, whose father, Dave, is a former UVA assistant who later had a long, successful run as Wake Forest’s head coach.

“And so hearing about [the ACC] and how much this means to people, it excites me,” Crawford said. “I’m really about legacy. I love legacy. I think that really matters. Every place we’ve worked, I’m just like, ‘OK, we have to leave our mark.’ ”

At UMBC, Utah State and VCU, Odom-coached teams advanced to the NCAA tournament, “and that’s so special,” Crawford said.

Odom has a blueprint for success, Crawford said. “I think there’s intentional things that happen in our program with Coach. I think how we play, it serves a lot of guys, and Coach does such a good job of letting people [play to their strengths]. And so all we gotta do is create that space for them.

“It’s tweaked from year to year, but the foundation is the same. We’re going to be unselfish. We’re going to pass. We’re going to play with great spacing. We’re going to make multiple efforts defensively. We’re going to try to dictate some things defensively.”

At Virginia, the new coaching staff has taken the reins of a program with a rich tradition. The Wahoos have made three Final Four appearances and won the NCAA title in 2019.

“This place is special,” Crawford said. “We want to protect and add to this legacy that has been established for a very, very long time. We are the stewards of this place. We have to honor that.”

Since arriving in Charlottesville, Crawford said, he’s learned “how much people take pride in the University of Virginia. Being a part of it, being an alum of the University of Virginia, that really, really matters to people. And I assume part of that is, it’s hard to get in. It’s hard to be a part of this exclusive club. And so that is super, super exciting.

“It’s a unique situation. You can come here and get a University of Virginia degree, and that’s a big deal. I would want that for my son, and I think a lot of people do. And you don’t have to sacrifice anything basketball-related either. You can get it all.”

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