Longtime Trousdale County football coach Clint Satterfield will be inducted into the TSSAA Hall of Fame in April.
Clint Satterfield enjoyed immense success as football coach at Trousdale County in the 1990s-2000s, winning five state championships before his retirement from coaching in 2007.
The successful 24-year coaching tenure, all with the Yellow Jackets, has earned Satterfield (who owns a 238-61 record) a spot with his late father, Jim, in the TSSAA Hall of Fame.
The Tennessee Secondary School Athletic Association on Thursday announced the 2016 class, which will be inducted at a ceremony on April 9 at the Embassy Suites in Murfreesboro.
Midstaters Allen Richardson (contributor, Murfreesboro), Lee Clayborne (administrator, Columbia) and Henry Phillips (official, Lawrenceburg) will also be among the nine new inductees.
When asked about the secret to his success, Clint Satterfield pointed to ideals he learned from his father, but also helped her garnered from others.
“It’s like the story about the turtle on the fence,” said Satterfield, who won state titles at Trousdale County in 1990, 1993, 1997, 1998 and 2005. “He didn’t get up there on his own. Someone put him there.
“It was all about our players and their parents. They made unbelievable commitment, sacrifice and hard work. That made all the difference in the world. It was nothing special, just a good blue-collar work ethic.”
For Satterfield, joining his father, a legendary coach in Trousdale County for which the middle school is named, was a huge honor.
“Most players will tell you that he taught us that football is a lot like life,” said Satterfield, who is currently Director of Schools in Trousdale County. “You learn how to work through difficult times and adversity and to work together. He said he would teach you things about life you couldn’t learn in the algebra classroom. But, he was an excellent teacher as well.”
Richardson has spent the past 29 years assisting the TSSAA with its golf tournament series as a rules official.
“It’s a big surprise,” Richardson said. “It’s humbling as well. There is probably so many other people out there more deserving than me.”
Phillips has been a registered official with TSSAA since 1967 in volleyball, basketball, softball and baseball. He has been an assigning officer in volleyball since 1994 and an assigning officer in baseball and softball since 2008.
Clayborne spent his entire career at Columbia Central, coaching every sport there but baseball, softball and golf. He took over as athletic director in 1982, a position he held for nearly 30 years before retiring in 2010.
Other TSSAA Hall of Fame inductees:
B. O. (Bo) Booth: Educator and administrator for 39 years in West Tennessee and served 28 of those years as principal and athletic director at Gibson County High School after being at Dyer High School for a short time. The Gibson County High School gymnasium is named in his honor. He retired in 2007.
Ed Foster: Administrator and coach from East Tennessee who served as a principal for nearly 25 years at East Ridge High School and Ooltewah High School. He served on the TSSAA Legislative Council from 1995-2009, and was president for five years and vice president for six. He has served as the executive director of the Tennessee Association of Secondary School Principals since 2009.
Ken Netherland: Netherland coached football in West Tennessee for nearly 40 years with stints at Hillcrest, Germantown, St. George’s and Lausanne high schools. He won two TSSAA state championships, one with Germantown in 1983 and one with St. George’s in 2007. He is the second-winningest coach in TSSAA history with 368 wins and ranks 31st nationally for all-time coaching victories.
Jill Prudden: Prudden coached girls basketball coach at Oak Ridge High School for 31 seasons. Her 908 wins rank her third in the state all time. Her teams won three TSSAA state championships (1988, 1994, 1997). Oak Ridge made 21 state tournament appearances under Prudden. She retired from coaching in 2010 and is teaching at Robertsville Middle School.
Joel Pierce: Pierce has been a registered TSSAA official for 48 years in baseball, football, basketball and softball. He has served as an assigning officer in Northeast Tennessee in those same sports since 1967 and is in that role currently. He worked the TSSAA state baseball tournament in 1991 and the TSSAA state football championships in 1992.
Gannett Tennessee’s Tom Kreager contributed to this report.