THE FLATS – Georgia Tech football head coach Brent Key is among 26 of the nation’s top coaches on the official preseason watch list for the 2025 Dodd Trophy, the Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year Foundation and Peach Bowl, Inc. announced on Monday.
The Dodd Trophy is presented annually to a head coach who leads his team to great success on the field, while also stressing the importance of scholarship, leadership and integrity – the three pillars of legendary Georgia Tech head coach Bobby Dodd’s coaching philosophy. This is the 50th anniversary of the award named in honor of Dodd, who led Tech to 165 wins and a national championship as the Yellow Jackets’ head coach from 1945-66.
Key, a Georgia Tech alumnus and football letterwinner, enters his third full season as the head coach at his alma mater. He’s led the Yellow Jackets to 14 wins in his first two seasons at the helm, which are tied for the third-most in Tech history, behind only College Football Hall of Famers Paul Johnson and William Alexander. He’s also led the Jackets to consecutive winning seasons and back-to-back bowl berths for the first time since 2013-14 and to consecutive fourth-place finishes in the Atlantic Coast Conference, after being picked to finish 12th in the 14-team conference in 2023 and 10th in the 17-team league in 2024.
The back-to-back fourth-place showings in ACC play have been spurred by the Jackets’ gaudy 6-1 record versus nationally ranked opponents since Key took the reins of the program as interim head coach five games into the 2022 season.
Off the field, Georgia Tech football had a 3.03 grade point average during the spring 2025 semester, which set an all-time record for the program and also marked the third-straight semester that the team had a GPA of 3.o or higher (also a program record). Tech football’s current NCAA Graduation Success Rate of 90% is also an all-time high.
In addition to being just one of 26 coaches on the preseason watch list for the Dodd Trophy, Key is one of only four ACC representatives among the 26 official candidates, joining Louisville’s Jeff Brohm, Miami (Fla.)’s Mario Cristobal and Clemson’s Dabo Swinney.
The Dodd Trophy watch list will be updated at midseason and finalists will be selected following the conclusion of the regular season. The winner of the 2025 Dodd Trophy will be announced during the week leading up to the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl (a college football playoff semifinal in 2026) in January.
Georgia Tech opens the 2025 season on Friday, Aug. 29 with a highly anticipated intersectional matchup at Colorado (8 p.m. ET – ESPN) and begins its home slate against Gardner-Webb on Saturday, Sept. 6 (3:30 p.m. – ACC Network Extra).
Georgia Tech has posted consecutive winning seasons for the first time in a decade and returns five all-ACC honorees from last season’s squad, including all-America guard and first-team all-conference selection Keylan Rutledge. Other top performers returning for the Yellow Jackets in 2025 include all-ACC selections DT Jordan van den Berg, LB Kyle Efford, RB Jamal Haynes and WR Malik Rutherford, as well as two of the league’s top quarterbacks in senior Haynes King and redshirt freshman Aaron Philo.
2025 GEORGIA TECH FOOTBALL SEASON TICKETS
2025 Georgia Tech football season, mini-plan and single-game tickets are on sale now.
Season tickets include the best seats for the Yellow Jackets’ six-game slate at Bobby Dodd Stadium at Hyundai Field, which features Atlantic Coast Conference showdowns versus Clemson, Pitt, Syracuse and Virginia Tech. Georgia Tech season ticket members also have elevated seating priority for tickets purchased for the 2025 edition of “Clean, Old-Fashioned Hate” versus archrival Georgia, set for Nov. 28 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
Tech’s 2025 mini-plan includes tickets to the home opener versus Gardner-Webb, Hall of Fame Weekend against Virginia Tech and Senior Day versus Pitt. Mini-plans offer a better value than purchasing seats at single-game prices without the commitment of a full season ticket.
For more information and to purchase 2025 Georgia Tech football tickets today, visit ramblinwreck.com/footballtickets.
Full Steam Ahead
Full Steam Ahead is a $500 million fundraising initiative to achieve Georgia Tech athletics’ goal of competing for championships at the highest level in the next era of intercollegiate athletics. The initiative will fund transformative projects for Tech athletics, including renovations of Bobby Dodd Stadium at Hyundai Field (the historic home of Georgia Tech football), the Zelnak Basketball Center (the practice and training facility for Tech basketball) and O’Keefe Gymnasium (the venerable home of Yellow Jackets volleyball), as well as additional projects and initiatives to further advance Georgia Tech athletics through program wide-operational support. All members of the Georgia Tech community are invited to visit atfund.org/FullSteamAhead for full details and renderings of the renovation projects, as well as to learn about opportunities to contribute online.
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