Jeff Paden joined the RSU athletic department as assistant athletic trainer starting in October 2015.
With the Hillcats, Paden is responsible for coverage of the athletic training needs of four sports, including men's and women's basketball, women's golf and baseball. He also assists the head athletic trainer in all aspects of the day-to-day operations of the athletic training room providing rehab, treatment and injury prevention for all sports at RSU.
Paden's areas of interest include lumbo-pelvic dysfunction as it relates to stress strain injuries, performance enhancement interventions, functional screening for performance and injury predisposition and the integration of sports injury rehabilitation with performance enhancement.
A native of Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, he spent the four years prior to his move to RSU working on the medical services team at Oklahoma Baptist University. His primary responsibilities included working with men's basketball and supervising coverage for the football and baseball programs, while also serving as an instructor in the Kinesiology and Leisure Studies department.
Paden has been certified as an athletic trainer working mainly at the university level, but assisting with some clinics and Arena Football League coverage. He is a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist through the NSCA and holds certifications as a Corrective Exercise Specialist and Performance Enhancement Specialist as well.
Paden worked at NCAA Division II Drury University for five years prior to joining the OBU medical staff, where his primary responsibilities included men's basketball, women's soccer, and tennis. While at Drury, he attended to the post-surgical rehabilitation needs of the student-athletes.
A 2005 graduate of Oklahoma State University, he later and earned his master's degree in health promotion from Missouri State University in 2007.
Paden and his wife, Claudia, have been married 10 years and reside in Broken Arrow.
