Ronald Bradley, state’s winningest basketball coach, remembered as a pioneer
Ronald Bradley won more games than any other high school basketball coach in Georgia history, but that’s hardly the scope of his influence.
“He was a pioneer and a pace-setter,” said Jackie Bradford, former president of the Atlanta Tipoff Club. “He was the bar the rest of us measured ourselves by.”
Bradley died Friday morning, a month shy of his 91st birthday. In a state where high school football was always king, Bradley elevated basketball to prominence through community involvement, promotion, preparation and unparalleled success.
“I think that some people were just born to do certain things,” said Darrell Huckaby, a 1970 graduate of Newton County High School who was the team’s manager. “I think he was created by God to be the person he was, to be a role model for young people, and to be competitive and excel at whatever he did.”
Bradley’s career spanned 49 years, and no one in Georgia has come close to his record of 1,372-413. He was 1,019-322 as a boys coach and 353-91 as a girls coach.
He has been inducted into the National High School Hall of Fame (2012), the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame (1997), the Georgia Athletic Coaches Association Hall of Fame (2011), the Atlanta Sports Hall of Fame (2013) and the Georgia Independent School Hall of Fame (1998).
After graduating from Avondale High School and the University of Georgia, where he was an outstanding basketball and baseball player, Bradley began his coaching career at Newton County High School in 1957. He stayed there until 1975 and coached at George Walton Academy from 1975-87, at Trinity Christian from 1989-94, Loganville from 1994-95, Piedmont Academy from 1997-99. Port St. Joe (Fla.) in 2000-01, Newton County from 2001-05, Greater Atlanta Christian (2005-07) and Heritage (2007-10).
“It wasn’t like we had a run of talent. It was just the opposite,” said Tony Harris, a 1969 Newton County graduate who went on to play and coach at the University of North Georgia. “He just took average talent and made something special. The way I’d describe it is everybody else was just a painter. He was Picasso.”
Bradley won at every stop along the way; there were 29 seasons with 20-plus wins, 17 region championships, six state finalists and three state championships. His teams won 129 consecutive home games over nine seasons at Newton County from 1959-67.
Perhaps his best coaching job came in 2004-05 when Newton County made an unlikely run to the state semifinals. The Rams, who didn’t have a player taller than 6-foot-4, failed to win their region championship but managed to reach the semifinals before losing to eventual champion Wheeler.
“That was kind of a turning point for me,” said Rick Rasmussen, who was an assistant coach on that team and currently is the head coach at North Oconee, the two-time defending state champions. “That’s where I realized that fundamentals and discipline really work. You’ve got to play together and have chemistry. Having two state titles, it kind of goes back to the things that we learned and the emphasis on fundamentals and discipline.”
Former players cited Bradley for his demanding nature and his preparation. Rasmussen still uses many of the drills and strategies he first learned from Bradley.
“He was a great teacher, a great coach, and his expectations were high,” Harris said. “Not everybody could play for him. The repetition, the fundamentals, the intensity that we had in practice, day after day. The games were easy.”
Huckaby said, “Our team was so prepared. It was like having the answers to the test.”
And the community turned out to watch. Newton County’s gymnasium — which was named in Bradley’s honor in 2000 — was always packed. It wasn’t uncommon for fans who were locked out by the fire marshal to climb to the top of the adjacent building and try to watch through the window, some of them bringing ladders for a better view.
“I remember the sheriff would meet the opposing team’s school bus at the county line and drive them around, lead them around the square, and they’d blow the sirens and all the merchants and the people would come out of their stores and point at the bus and scream, ‘Ram bait, Ram bait,’” Huckaby said. “The gym would be full hours before the game started and people would be lined up four- and five-deep around the court. It was just an atmosphere that I’ve never seen before or since.”
Harris said, “He gave us something special when he was here.”
Bradley became a mentor to other coaches, among them Caesar Burgess, who spent years as an assistant at Marietta before becoming the head coach at Chamblee.
“Coach Bradley just took me under his wing when I became the coach at Chamblee,” Burgess said. “We used to eat together, talk and spend time together. He pretty much adopted me as a son. He was just an unbelievable wealth of knowledge about everything. He was always encouraging and supportive with young coaches.”
Bradley and his wife, Jan, who died in July, were a role model for the coach-spouse partnership. They were high school sweethearts, married 71 years and rarely apart; she was the scorekeeper or timekeeper and missed only five games throughout his career.
“We learned how to be a role model of a couple that cares about their kids, is committed and is always there,” said Rasmussen, whose wife, Tiffany, keeps the scorebook for his games now. “Coach Bradley and Mrs. Bradley were a great team, and we try to do the same thing.”
Bradley also coached football for 19 seasons and went 130-69-6 with one state championship in 1979 at George Walton. As a baseball coach his teams went 158-60 with five region championships and two appearances in the state final.
“I’ve been around sports all my life,” Huckaby said. “I’ve never run into another person who had the combination of drive, competitiveness and charisma that he had. I was from Porterdale, which was (a) little mill village, and he just opened my eyes to so many opportunities that I didn’t get to experience otherwise. He showed me how my life could be lived.”
Plans are being made for a celebration of Bradley’s life at a future date.
About the Author
Stan Awtrey has been covering sports for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution since 1977. He currently writes about high school sports, Georgia State University athletics and golf.
