Melanie Walls
Melanie Walls
Title: Associate Head Coach / Director of Player Development
Phone: 931-372-6294
Email: mwalls@tntech.edu

As Tennessee Tech women’s basketball associate head coach Melanie Walls enters her eighth season with the Golden Eagle program, the mission has not changed – make sure the Tech student-athletes succeed not just on the court but also in the classroom. While Walls has many responsibilities as an assistant coach, her three main duties are to serve as the team’s offensive coordinator, the skill development coach and the academic liaison.

As the offensive coordinator for the Tech women’s basketball team, there’s no question that part of the equation has been fulfilled. During the 2022-23 campaign, the Golden Eagles ranked as the top scoring offense in the Ohio Valley Conference, averaging 71.3 points per game.

Tech also led the league in field goal percentage (.442), 3-point field goal percentage (.347), assists (16.3 per game), assist/turnover ratio (1.2) and 3-pointers made per game (6.9). The Golden Eagles also finished third in free-throw percentage (.767).

On the academic side, the Tech women have posted its best cumulative grade point averages in the last eight semesters, while also recognized by the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association last summer as an Academic Top 25 team for the first time with a No. 21 ranking.

In Fall 2022, the team posted a 3.603 GPA – its second-best ever outside of the Spring 2020 COVID-19 semester as the University switched to online classes for the term at the onset of the pandemic. In Fall 2022, all 14 student-athletes had a 3.0 or better with nine recording a 3.5 or higher and four with a perfect 4.0 GPA.

After the Fall 2020 semester, the team’s cumulative GPA has not dropped lower than 3.498.

As the program’s player development coach, Walls has helped develop 1,000-point scorers in Yaktavia Hickson, Jordan Brock, Kesha Brady, Anna Jones, Mackenzie Coleman and Maaliya Owens to give Tech 35 total in its 54-season history. She also helped develop record-breakers like Brock (career 3-pointers made), Owens (single-season 3-pointers made) and Anacia Wilkinson (career and single-season blocks). Jada Guinn also became one of six Tech women’s basketball players to record more than 750 points, 300 assists, 500 rebounds and 125 steals in a career.

Walls’ watch has also led to five All-OVC first-team selections in Hickson, Brock, Brady, Jones and Owens, five second-team picks in Brady, Brock, Jones, Coleman and Guinn, as well as three all-newcomer team nods to Coleman, Jones and Anna Walker.

The 2022-23 campaign was a successful one for the Tech staff as the team recorded its 10th OVC tournament championship – its first since 1999-2000 – and earned a trip to the NCAA Tournament, securing the program’s first victory in the field since 1990 with a First Four win over Monmouth.

Over the course of this historic season, the Tennessee Tech women earned their 1,000th program win – becoming just the 21st Division I team to reach that milestone. With 23 victories in the 2022-23 season, they became the first Golden Eagle women's basketball team to collect back-to-back 20-win seasons since 2004-05 and 2005-06, the first to reach consecutive OVC championship games since 2011-12 and 2012-13, as well as the first to have five straight winning seasons, five straight OVC winning seasons and five straight seasons with double-digit OVC wins since 2001-02.

Walls joined the Golden Eagle family after spending eight years at the Gatewood School in Eatonton, Ga., where she served as an assistant athletic director, head girls basketball and track coach and high school math teacher. She led her basketball teams to a 218-23 overall record, six region championships (2010-13, 2015-16), and three state championships (2010, 2012, 2016). While at Gatewood, Walls was named the Region Basketball Coach of the Year six times and the AA/AAA State Basketball Coach of the Year three times.

Prior to her time at Gatewood, Walls accumulated 10 years of Division I coaching experience. She was an assistant coach and recruiting coordinator at the University of Alabama from 2005-08. She was an assistant coach and compliance coordinator for Middle Tennessee State University from 2000-05, where she helped guide the Blue Raiders to a 99-55 mark during her five-year stint. While at MTSU, Coach Rosamond and Walls were assistants together from 2003-05. They helped MTSU capture two Sun Belt Conference Championships and two NCAA second-round appearances (2004 and 2005). In 2004, the duo helped guide the No. 13-seed Blue Raiders to one of the biggest upsets in the NCAA Tournament that season with a win over No. 4-seed North Carolina. Again in 2005, the tandem helped pull another surprising upset in the tournament when No. 12-seed MTSU defeated No. 5-seed North Carolina State.

Walls was a four-year, record-setting letterwinner at Georgia College & State University, in Milledgeville, Ga., and graduated from GC&SU with a bachelor’s degree in 1996. She earned her master’s degree from GC&SU in 1998 while serving as a graduate assistant with her alma mater. She began her coaching career with one season at Binghamton (N.Y.) University (1998-99) followed by a year at Indiana (1999-2000) before heading to MTSU.

A native of Eatonton, Ga., Walls is married to Marcus Walls, a successful high school football coach in his own right. The couple has two children – Brookelyn and Brylee. Her daughter Brookelyn will also enter the intercollegiate athletics scene this fall as she signed to play women’s lacrosse after a successful run at Cookeville High School.