Just two years ago, Georgia Tech seemed like it was at a low point. They had gone through three horrible seasons under former head coach Geoff Collins and the outlook for the 2022 season did not look promising. The season started with a blowout loss to Clemson on Labor Day, they followed it up with a win at Western Carolina (a game in which they gave up a ton of yards), and then had embarrassing and noncompetitive losses to Ole Miss and UCF. The play on the field was a mess and hard to watch at times and after the loss to UCF, Georgia Tech fired Collins and then-athletic director Todd Stansbury and faced a pivotal hire at both the Athletic Director position and at the head coaching position. If they missed on the hires, Georgia Tech was at risk of falling even further behind.
While there is still work to be done and things to be accomplished, the hires of Brent Key as the head coach and J Batt as the Athletic Director at Georgia Tech are starting to pay off and they might just be getting started. There is a buzz around this program that has not been there in years and those two guys are the main reason why.
While it was not a perfect first season as the head coach, Key made the hires and the personnel changes to Georgia Tech to being one of the top offenses in the ACC. He helped land Texas A&M quarterback transfer Haynes King, who went on to have a really good season for the Yellow Jackets, he hired offensive coordinator Buster Faulkner and offensive line coach Geep Wade, who were both instrumental in the turn around of the Yellow Jackets offense. Wade transformed one of the nation's worst offensive lines to one of the best in the ACC and they led the league in rushing. Faulkner led one of the biggest offensive turnarounds in the country. Georgia Tech was one of the funnest teams in the country to watch.
The second half of the year is when the team really started to click. They upset North Carolina behind a great offensive performance, blew out Virginia, gave No. 1 Georgia all they could handle (while rushing for over 200 yards in the game), and capped off the year with the programs first bowl appearance since 2018 and their first bowl win since 2016. This program and team finally had an identity and with the majority of the offense coming back and Key making new hires on the defensive side of the ball, there was optimism that something special was being put together on The Flats. The Yellow Jackets finished well in recruiting on signing day, flipping defensive end Amontrae Bradford from Colorado and landing four-star running back Anthony Carrie.
Their was still more good news on the way though and that is where Batt comes in.
The Alexander-Tharpe Fund, Georgia Tech athletics’ fundraising arm has contributed a record $78,197,499 to Tech athletics during the 2024 fiscal year, which ended on June 30. The $78 million-plus raised shattered the previous record for single-year A-T Fund donations and represents a 161% year-over-year increase.
“As the landscape of college athletics shifts and the financial resources needed to compete for championships at the highest level increase, we are so grateful for our donors stepping up to the plate and making a record-breaking impact on Tech athletics,” Batt said. “An extraordinary level of donor engagement is vital to our goal of fielding one of the nation’s elite athletics programs, and through their record contributions in 2023-24, our A-T Fund donors have shown that they are eager to be a part of the exciting, long-term future of Tech athletics. On behalf of our student-athletes, coaches and staff, we thank everyone who invested in our student-athletes and teams through your A-T Fund donation in 2023-24, and encourage everyone to help keep the momentum going through contributions to the A-T Fund, The Tech Way and the purchase of season tickets in 2024-25.”
Batt deserves a lot of credit for this amount raised. When he was hired as the Athletic Director back in 2022, he had a reputation of being a great fund raiser at Alabam, where he previously worked. He has put those skills to work for Georgia Tech and it is paying off with this news.
Of the $78 million-plus contributed in cash and pledges to the A-T Fund during the 2024 fiscal year, nearly 90% came in the form of non-seat related gifts, including more than 20 gifts of $1 million or more.
In addition to being a 161% increase from FY23, the $78 million-plus raised in FY24 is 43% more than the previous A-T Fund single-year record of $55,559,723 raised in 2019-20.
“This year’s results reflect the strong legacy of Georgia Tech athletics and the present-day passion our alumni, fans and community have to see our student-athletes excel and our teams win,” Georgia Tech vice president for development Jen Howe said. “We look forward to continuing to work with J and his team to bring increased support to athletics that allows us to take on the changing NCAA landscape.”
The past few weeks have continued to enforce the belief that Brent Key is showing what Georgia Tech is capable of. He scored perhaps the biggest recruiting win in Georgia Tech history today by landing five star offensive tackle Josh Petty over powerhouse programs like Florida State and Ohio State. Two years ago, this would have seemed impossible, but Key is putting Georgia Tech squarely in the mix again. Not only that, but Georgia Tech has received predictions to land former four-star Georgia commit Christian Garrett, who backed off of his pledge to the Bulldogs last night. It would vault Georgia Tech's recruiting class into the top 20 and put them in position to land one of the best classes they have ever had. Key has gotten the recruiting to trend in the a direction this program has not seen before and while there is still work to be done in all areas, it is impossible to deny the job that is being done and Key deserves a lot of credit for that, as does J Batt.
