Dalton's Mayo, former Southeast coach Kell nominated for inaugural class of Georgia High School Football Hall of Fame
Jun. 28—Former Dalton High School great Bill Mayo didn't know a hall of fame for Georgia high school football was in the works, so he was doubly surprised when he saw his name among the 100-player list in consideration for the inaugural class of the Georgia High School Football Hall of Fame.
"A friend of mine sent it to me, and I was just so surprised," said Mayo, who starred as an offensive lineman at Dalton before his 1980 graduation. After being named the 1980 Class 3A lineman of the year, Mayo played four years at the University of Tennessee, where he was named an All-American. "Offensive lineman don't normally get a lot of recognition, which is understandable, but it's nice to be included. It's an honor just to be nominated."
Mayo is on the 100-player list for the hall of fame, which is organized by sports marketing website Score Atlanta. The company revealed the nominations earlier this month, along with nine automatic inductees to the inaugural 36-player class that will be announced next month and enshrined at a ceremony at the College Football Hall of Fame in Atlanta in October.
The nine players that have already been announced as part of the 36-player class are all members of the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
"Georgia's such a great state for high school football, I think it's such a natural thing to do to recognize high school football in the state. It was a long time ago that I was in high school," Mayo joked. "It was nice that they even remembered that far back."
Mayo is far from the oldest on the list of nominees. Players are broken down into categories by time period, with the oldest on the list being Bob McWhorter, a 1909 graduate of Gordon Institute.
Mayo is situated among other players from the 1980s, while the 1960s includes another figure with Dalton and Whitfield County connections.
Chip Kell, a former head football coach at Southeast Whitfield, is on the list for his exploits at Avondale High School. Kell also played on the offensive line at Tennessee, being selected as a first-team All-American twice prior to spending time in the Canadian Football League. After time coaching at Valley Point Middle School, Kell coached at Southeast for four seasons, starting in 2002. Kell was selected for the College Football Hall of Fame in 2006.
The new high school hall of fame only counts accomplishments as a player in consideration for induction. High school coaches have their own hall of fame, the Georgia Athletic Coaches Association Hall of Fame, which is inside the Dalton Convention Center.
Mayo also added to his résumé as a coach after his playing career. He spent several years as the offensive line coach at his alma mater at Dalton, also working with the program on radio broadcasts.
"It's great that Dalton is represented on this list," Mayo said. "Hopefully everybody affiliated with Dalton can take some pride that we're one of the top programs in the state. There's a whole lot of guys from Dalton that could have been on that list instead of me. Hopefully we'll get some more Dalton guys in that cycle as we go along."
The new high school hall of fame will continue inducting players in coming years after installing the inaugural class this fall. Players must have been out of high school for eight years and retired from football. The hall is run by a board of directors, which is broken down in to 12 regions that will make nominations from all areas of the state for consideration in the hall. A final location where the hall will be housed has not yet been decided, according to Score Atlanta. To view the entire list, go to www.scoreatl.com.
