Vince Dooley named Georgia Bulldogs’ representative in 2019 SEC Legends class

Former Georgia head football coach and athletic director Vince Dooley was among those selected for the 2019 Southeastern Conference Football Legends class, announced Thursday by the SEC office.

The class will be honored at the 2019 SEC Football Weekend of Champions Dec. 6-7 in Atlanta, highlighted by the annual SEC Legends Dinner on Friday, Dec. 6 at the Hyatt Regency in Atlanta. The group also will be recognized prior to the SEC Football Championship Game, which will be held at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Saturday, Dec. 7. 

Each conference school has one SEC Legend each year in football. 

In Dooley’s 25 years as head football coach (1964-88), he guided the Bulldogs to a career record of 201-77-10, becoming only the ninth coach in NCAA Division I history to win over 200 games. The Bulldogs won one national championship (1980) and six SEC titles under his direction.

He took his teams to 20 Bowl games and coached a Heisman Trophy winner (Herschel Walker, 1982), a Maxwell Award Winner (Walker, 1982), an Outland Award Winner (Bill Stanfill, 1968), 40 First Team All-Americans and 10 Academic All-Americans. He was named NCAA National Coach of the Year in 1980 and SEC Coach of the Year seven times.

Under his watch as athletic director (1979-2004), Georgia teams won 23 national championships, 78 SEC team championships and numerous individual national titles in both men’s and women’s sports. In recognition of his achievements, the field at Sanford Stadium was named in his honor on September 7, 2019.

The SEC Legends program was started in the 1994 season and the following former Bulldogs have been chosen to participate: Charley Trippi (1994), Fran Tarkenton (1995), Bill Stanfill (1996), Terry Hoage (1997), John Rauch (1998), Herschel Walker (1999), Kevin Butler (2000), Tommy Lyons (2001), George Patton (2002), Scott Woerner (2003), Mike Wilson (2004), Zeke Bratkowski (2005), Garrison Hearst (2006), Rex Robinson (2007), Eric Zeier (2008), Matt Stinchcomb (2009), Ben Zambiasi (2010), Boss Bailey (2011), David Greene (2012), Tim Worley (2013), John Little (2014), Richard Seymour (2015), Jon Stinchcomb (2016), Champ Bailey (2017) and Hines Ward (2018).