Next year, Martin will be able to celebrate one of the biggest honors of his career. He’s part of the Ohio Basketball Hall of Fame’s 2024 class, which was announced Monday.
“I’m just extremely excited,” Martin said, “and it’s just crazy how this all came together. I just wish that honestly the day of the ceremony that I could have every coach and every player and every person who surrounded our programs stand with me, because this is way more than just about me.”
Members of the 2024 class, which also includes Dayton-area official Thurman Leggs Jr., will be honored April 20 in Columbus.
For Martin, the honor will come eight years after his last game at Cedarville. He retired after the 2015-16 season with a record of 380-108 in 15 seasons.
Cedarville won 20 games twice in its history before Martin was hired before the 2001-02 season. He won at least 20 games in all but two seasons and topped 30 victories three times. His teams reached the NAIA Division II national championship games in 2004 and 2005, losing both times to Morningside University, of Sioux City, Iowa. The tournament happened to be played those years in Sioux City.
“There were 6,800 people rooting for them and 200 people rooting for us,” Martin said.
Martin’s Cedarville teams won 72 straight conference games from 2004-06. He was part of an even longer streak at Southeastern, which won 162 straight games in the Kenton Trail Conference from 1987-2000.
Martin’s crowning achievement as a coach at the high school level came in 1996 when he coached Southeastern to the Division IV state championship. The Trojans also reached the state championship game in 1988 and the final four in 1989 under Martin.
Martin was 264-17 in his first stint at Southeastern. He stepped down in 1997 after 11 seasons but returned in 1999 and coached two more seasons before taking the job at Cedarville, his alma mater, in 2001.
“Twenty five years ago, I came to South Charleston as a 22-year-old seventh-grade boys basketball coach and had no clue how to even write a practice schedule,” Martin told the News-Sun in 2001. “Thanks to the people of South Charleston, who they are and what they are about, they’ve made me what I am. Me being able to go back to Cedarville as the women’s head basketball coach is a direct result of what they have done for me.”
Martin needed plenty of help in his early years and got it at Southeastern. Former Ohio State star Gary Bradds was the head boys basketball coach at Southeastern when Martin arrived at the school and told Martin he needed to watch him run practices to learn the game. Sam McGinnis took over for Bradds and also helped Martin.
No one helped Martin in the game more over the years than his longtime assistant coach Jim “Bodie” Lightle, who stayed with the program from Martin’s first season in 1986-87 through the 2012-13 season. He was the head coach, with a record of 180-83, in his final 11 seasons.
“We didn’t know what we were doing,” Martin said. “We just took over the girls program when nobody else was really wanting to step forward, and we did it together. We scouted together. We went to awards meetings together. At every one of our practices, we were together. We inputted our information together. He stood right there with me.”
These days, Martin spends his days at the golf course. He was on his way to Locust Hills on Tuesday when he talked to the News-Sun. He also has seven grandkids — six girls and one boy — to keep him busy. One granddaughter, Kate, just committed to play volleyball at Liberty University.
The hall of fame ceremony next year will give Martin a chance to thank his family and all his former players and assistant coaches. When asked Tuesday what his players would say about him as a coach, he got emotional, saying, “What I think they would say — I probably could have a tough time getting this one out — is that I cared about them much more than I cared if we’d won or lost.”
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