The West TN Madisons: Proof Age Is Just a Number

Written & Photographed by Maddie McMurry

I walked into the gym at First Methodist in downtown Jackson and found a group of women in their 70s running full-court drills, shooting free throws, and talking trash like they're still playing high school basketball. But maybe with a little more life lived and compassion for each other because of the “family” they all have become. They're the West Tennessee Madisons, a senior Olympics women's basketball team with four national championships, a 24-year track record, and a bond that runs a lot deeper than the game. 

At the center of it all is their long-time coach, Jodie Parrish, known around Jackson for her real estate career and her basketball resume. She's the broker owner at Re/Max and calls herself "the Coach Approach Realtor,” and has lived in Jackson her entire life. 

Jodie's basketball story starts long before the Madisons existed. She played at Southside High School, then went on to Union University, where she was part of the first women's basketball team and the program's first MVP, back in 1974.

"We wore cutoff shorts and t-shirts," she laughed, as she remembered just how different the game looked before Title IX changed everything.

After college, she spent 12 years coaching high school basketball, eight years at Old Hickory Academy (now USJ) and four at Southside, the same school she'd played for. Along the way, she even squared off against a young Pat Summitt, who was playing for UT Martin at the same time she was playing for Union. 

"She got around her girl, and I got switched off and had to get on the baseline," Jodie remembers. "She would hit me, just knock me down. It was a charge. So I tell people, I've been her stepping stone all those years. Both times we played them, we beat them."

Beating Pat Summitt’s team is a pretty good bragging right and a fun fact she wanted me to know. 

After coaching, Jodie's basketball career went quiet for a while, until she turned 50, which is the minimum age to compete in the Senior Olympics. She had been counting down the days until she could play again.

"They had already started — some of my players turned 51 a year before I did," she said. "So they were already playing, and then I got to join, it was the most exciting thing in my life.”

That was 24 years ago. Today, she both coaches and plays for the Madisons, a team built around three-on-three, half-court basketball. The rules are adjusted for age, but the competitiveness is always dialed all the way up. Games are two 15-minute halves with two timeouts, and teams are grouped in five-year age brackets. Right now, the Madisons compete in the 70-to-75 division, but by the time nationals roll around again in Oklahoma, they'll have aged into the 75-to-80 bracket. The team includes: Linda Lipscomb (number 23), Polly Whitten (number 10), Jada Slayton (number 7), Jodie Parrish (number 21), and Rita Carmichael (number 35). 

They practice twice a week, religiously, Mondays and Thursdays, 5:30 to 7:00 p.m. This kind of consistency has kept them not just playing, but winning, for over two decades.

The Madisons have qualified for nationals over and over by placing first or second at the Tennessee state tournament every June, and they've brought home four national championships — the first in 2007, then a run of titles in 2019, 2022, and 2023. Even the years in between these wins, they were always in the top three. 

I asked Jodie for her favorite memory over the past 24 years and she didn’t hesitate: 2019, Albuquerque, New Mexico at the national titles. 

The format was unforgiving — lose one game, and you were out. The Madisons went undefeated through round robin, then ran into a Tennessee team that had never beaten them before.

"They whipped us," Jodie said. "That put us into the losers' bracket."

From there, the only way to win gold was through five straight games in a single day, starting at 7 a.m. The Madisons beat the Tennessee team that had just beaten them. They beat the strongest team in California from San Diego. Then they faced a Louisiana team they knew well, the Hoopaholics, twice in a row: once in the semifinal, which they won by a single point, and again in the championship just hours later, which they won by three.

“I mean we earned that,” Jodie said. “So at that point, we decided we were pretty good."

Even with all the trophies, what stands out most talking to Jodie isn't the wins, it's the people and the relationships these women have.

"We're just close like that," she said. "I mean, we were more like family than anything else... when somebody passes away, we go to the funerals. So it's more than just basketball. We all love basketball, and that's what brought us together. But we also love each other."

They’ve all grown up together – raising kids, grandkids, walking through every season of life together. That closeness has been tested through the years. Of the original core group, only Jodie and her longtime teammate Rita remain — one player passed away, and two others now live with broken hips. Rita herself has had both knees replaced, and Jodie has had three knee replacements between her two knees. But even through the bruises, the surgeries, and the aches, none of it has been enough to make any of them walk away.

"I see a lot of people my age who do not exercise or play any sports or do anything, and it's sad in a way," Jodie says. "Here we are out running up and down the court, so I know for a fact that it's helped us to stay healthy."

The team is also committed to the local community in Jackson. Each October, the Madisons host a memorial tournament at Northeast Middle School, honoring former teammate Barbara Hill. Last year, 12 teams traveled in from as far as Connecticut, Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Texas. 

“Just like we go to all those places, they come and support us,” Jodie said. 

This is proof of just how many friendships this team has built over years of playing the same opponents again and again on courts across the country. 

“We all love basketball, and that’s what brought us together. But we also love each other. It’s a fun friendship. Dear friendships,” Jodie said.  

Basketball has shaped every part of Jodie’s life, and that’s seen through one number: 21. Born on May 21st, it's shown up everywhere. Her jersey number, her phone number, her real estate branding. Around Jackson, she's simply known as JP21.

“I wouldn’t take anything for it [basketball]. It goes: God, family, basketball.”

For Jodie and the West TN Madisons, basketball was never just a season of life. It's the thread that's run through all of it: high school, college, coaching, motherhood, grandmotherhood, a career, and a friendship group that's outlasted knee replacements, decades, and the loss of teammates who became family.

They'll keep practicing twice a week in the same gym, chasing one more title, for as long as their bodies let them.