It’s a good thing Osbourn Park’s (Manassas, VA) Quillie Odom can play with pain. Had he not played almost his entire junior season with a broken thumb, perhaps he wouldn’t have earned a scholarship from Virginia Tech. But he did and, on Tuesday, became the first player to commit to the Hokies for the 2007 class.

Odom thought he had just jammed his thumb during a preseason football practice, but, when the thumb was hit the next day while he was playing basketball, he knew something more was wrong. He had indeed suffered a break and ending up missing the first two games of the season because of the injury.

“It was a lot of pain,” said Odom, who had pins inserted into his thumb. “I just sucked up the pain and played with it. I played with a cast. I wrapped it up as tight as I could. I didn’t care if I could feel it or not. Once I got in the game, there was just no pain after that. I had the opportunity to make plays at middle linebacker and show everybody what I could do.”

In what turned out to be a productive junior season, Odom racked up 72 tackles and earned first-team all-Cedar Run district and all-Northwest region honors for his performance. The 6-1, 200-pound standout also earned an honorable mention on the all-state squad.

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