Gold and Black is a multi-platform media company that covers Purdue athletics like no one else.
Issue link: http://read.uberflip.com/i/766803
GOLD AND BLACK ILLUSTRATED VOLUME 27, ISSUE 3 71 D ominique Oden doesn't remember much about that moment in 2002. It's probably a good thing. As a 4-year-old, Oden sat in the backseat of her dad's car with her siblings, as Marquis ran inside a New Orleans barbershop to schedule a haircut for his son. The children were still there, probably napping a bit, when Marquis came back out and was confronted by a man he knew, a man he had tried to help, but a man who also held a grudge. Marquis Oden was a school teacher, and at times over the years he had taken a group of students up to Angola, the Louisiana State Penitentiary that's also known as the "Alcatraz of the South," to show them what not to become. He wanted to scare them straight. But the message hadn't set in with Michael Moore. On that spring day, Moore pulled a gun and shot Mar- quis Oden dead on the sidewalk, as the children sat only feet away. It wasn't the Oden family's last tragedy. Three years later, the family was forced to pack up quickly, tossing essentials into a van and heading east, never to return home. When Hurricane Katrina hit right after, it destroyed parts of New Orleans and tossed 11 feet of water into the Oden family home, all but toppling it to the ground. Dominique Oden was tested at an early age, but those trials helped shape who she is now. The 18-year-old freshman is mature beyond her years, unfazed by basketball, as she's taken to the challenges at Purdue — she's also an architectural engineering major, but don't tell her that's too much to handle — in only her first few months in West La- fayette. "The story goes on and on and on," mom Trudy Oden said. "There are a lot of things that we have been through that makes her the way she is. She's just a strong kid." UNFLAPPABLE Trudy Oden has seen her second daughter get rat- tled on a basketball court only once. It was in the quarterfinals of the Georgia state girls basketball tournament last season, when two of Domi- nique's teammates suffered significant knee injuries. One was younger sister Diarra, who tore her ACL for the third time, a heartbreaking injury considering Dominique had basically begged her to spend one more season playing together. The injuries, and loss, ended Oden's career at Marist High School. Most occasions, she looks collected on the court: The 5-foot-8 guard is calm, not a bit nervous or anx- ious, unaffected by the opponent or the stage or any- thing else. She's been unflappable at Purdue, where she's quickly become a starter and consistent, averag- ing 11.1 points per game through mid-December. Oden treats the court like it's her sanctuary, a place where she can't be affected by outside forces. "Since we relocated to Atlanta, since the first time she told me she wanted to play basketball, that was part of our coping," Trudy Oden said. "I had to find a different outlet, not just for the girls but for me. So they couldn't think about all the adversities and the bad things that were coming against us. For Domi- nique, it's always been basketball and books." In the Oden family, headed by a single mom of four daughters, it was critical to be self-reliant, especially in those days. Oldest daughter Diamond was so, focus- ing on lacrosse and her studies, plus taking on more household responsibilities after her father's death. This spring, she'll graduate from Cornell. Dominique, three years younger, was an indepen- dent personality early. Near the family's neighborhood in Atlanta, she found a second home at the YMCA. She hung out there as often as possible — Trudy, who works in hospice, also had a second job as the Y's as- sistant youth sports director then — and was a regu- lar in organized leagues and in open gyms. She was spotted shooting around by an AAU coach, back when the family had no idea what AAU was, and asked to come to a callout. She did and joined the Georgia Metros. "She's never afraid. She's not scared." Teammate Miracle Gray