Kirby Smart, Cam Newton head 33 picked for Georgia High School Football Hall of Fame

Georgia football coach Kirby Smart and former NFL MVP and Heisman Trophy winner Cam Newton will headline this year’s inductees into the Georgia High School Football Hall of Fame.

Also part for the 2025 class will be NBA legend Walt Frazier of Atlanta’s old Howard High, former Falcons and Georgia Tech star Keith Brooking of East Coweta and 2025 Pro Football Hall of Fame honoree Sterling Sharpe of Glennville.

Smart was an all-state defensive back on Bainbridge’s 1993 team that reached the semifinals of Class 4A, then the highest classification. He became a two-time All-SEC safety at Georgia.

Newton was a five-star quarterback recruit who led Atlanta’s Westlake to playoff victories in 2005 and 2006. He took Auburn to the 2010 national title and the Carolina Panthers to Super Bowl 50 in 2016.

Frazier led Howard, now a middle school, to records of 8-1 and 7-2-1 in his junior and season seasons in the old Georgia Interscholastic Association during segregation.

Brooking was Georgia Tech’s leading tackler for three seasons and played 15 NFL seasons, making the Pro Bowl five times.

Score Atlanta, which administers the Hall of Fame, announced the group Tuesday morning. Sharpe was an automatic inductee for making the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Forty-four board members working from a 100-player ballot selected the other 32.

The board also selected two historic teams for special recognition: the undefeated 1971 Valdosta and 1976 Warner Robins teams that were named national champions by the National Sports News Service.

Valdosta’s quarterback that year, Stan Bounds, and its defensive coordinator, Jack Rudolph, will be among this year‘s inductees — Rudolph as a former Grady High player under Erk Russell in the 1950s. He went on to play in the AFL.

Jack’s son, Coleman — who starred at Valdosta and Georgia Tech in the 1980s and 1990s — also was selected for induction.

The 33 inductees range in eras from the early 1920s, when Tom Nash starred at Wilkes County’s Washington High before going on to become a University of Georgia All-American selection, to 2010, when Carver-Columbus’ Isaiah Crowell was named the AJC’s all-classification player of the year before playing five NFL seasons.

Frazier‘s selection, the most unusual, was no gimmick. The Black-owned Atlanta World newspaper called Frazier Atlanta’s best quarterback and reported that he signed to play football at Indiana. However, Frazier never went there, choosing basketball instead.

Frazier, now 80, works as a Knicks color commentator. He was asked in a 2024 interview with Ahmad Rashad whether football was his best high school sport.

“I thought so,” Frazier said. “I was an excellent passer. Johnny Unitas was my idol. So I could throw like 50, 60 yards. Growing up in the South, football is king. My mom never came to a basketball game.”

This will be the Hall of Fame’s fourth induction class. Georgia and Georgia Tech players have always been well-represented, and that will be the case again.

Former Bulldogs going in this year will be Lindsay Scott and Freddie Gilbert from Georgia’s 1980 national championship team, as well as Smart, Nash, Jack “The Ripper” Roberts, Paul Gilbert, Knox Culpepper, Robert Edwards and Curt McGill.

Former Yellow Jackets will include Brooking, the Rudolphs, Stumpy Thomason, Kim King, Reggie Wilkes and Josh Nesbitt.