Led by veteran quartet, Georgia Tech’s secondary a mix of transfers, youth

There is a quartet of familiar veterans in the Georgia Tech secondary: Clayton Powell-Lee, Ahmari Harvey, Rodney Shelley and Omar Daniels. Outside of that, though, the Yellow Jackets will mostly be relying on a mixture of youth and transfers to form a solid unit on the back end of its defense this season.

But there is no shortage of options to plug and play, Powell-Lee said.

“It’s the most depth we’ve had in the past three or four years, if I’m being honest,” he said. “The depth that we have is really special in my eyes because you’re able to interchange players. Everybody ain’t got to just play boundary safety, field safety, or just dime or mike.

“The depth is so crazy, so you’re going to see a lot of different players playing different positions. It’s going to be fun, though, because we’re all learning everything.”

Powell-Lee has been a fixture at safety for the Yellow Jackets since 2022 when he arrived from Westlake High School. He has played nearly 40 games and was Tech’s second-highest graded run defender, behind Harvey, in 2024, according to Pro Football Focus.

Harvey began his career at Auburn but transferred after one season. He has played 33 games for Tech since and had a team high 48 solo tackles last season. Cornerbacks coach Kobie Jones said Tuesday that Harvey is a guy the Yellow Jackets win “because of” and praised the senior for his ability to make clutch plays.

Daniels, who transferred from Kansas State before the 2023 season, and Shelley were both key contributors in ’24 while playing multiple positions in the secondary.

“Them guys have played a lot of ball. There’s a lot of experience, lot of reps, lot of bank reps. It’s easy for them guys to actually help me teach the younger guys,” defensive backs coach Cory People said of the veterans in the secondary. “They got great leadership. (Powell-Lee) and (Daniels) have both grown a lot since last year since I’ve been here. Them guys have done a great job leading the younger guys.”

To give that crew help, Tech brought in Daiquan White (5-10, 180) from Eastern Michigan, Savion Riley (6-2, 205) from Colorado, Jy Gilmore (5-9, 190) from Georgia State, Kelvin Hill (5-10, 190) from Alabama Birmingham and Jon Mitchell (5-11, 185) from Penn State. Elgin Sessions, Dalen Pension, Fenix Felton, Jayden Barr and Tae Harris were part of Tech’s signing class that has increased the level of depth and talent.

Some of those freshmen could crack the two-deep later this month when Tech travels to Colorado.

“Play style, that’s the first thing. Are you going hard, no matter what the call is, no matter if you made the right check or executed the right way, are you gonna play hard?” Jones said about how he evaluates his roster. “Because everything is not gonna be perfect during the game. There’s gonna be times something happens. So just seeing the play style, those guys that are gonna play hard when things go wrong. The adversity shows up, how you gonna play?

“And then who’s executing? You wanna be able to trust those guys when they’re out there on the field. So the biggest thing for me is play style and can you execute down after down?”