Georgia Tech and Brent Key break through with highest-rated recruit in over 20 years

Brent Key made a pledge to his supporters shortly after taking over as the head coach at Georgia Tech.

“I promise every fiber in my body will go towards making us a champion,” Key said on Dec. 5, 2022, just six days after the university lifted the interim tag from his job title. “Every single fiber in my body will be directed towards that one objective.”

Georgia Tech is still building, but on Monday, Key and his staff made their biggest statement to date on the recruiting trail when four-star offensive tackle Josh Petty committed to the Yellow Jackets over Ohio State, Florida State, Tennessee and Stanford.

Petty — the nation’s No. 37 player, No. 5 offensive tackle and No. 7 prospect in Georgia in the 247Sports Composite — is the program’s first top-50 recruit since five-star wide receiver Calvin Johnson in the Class of 2004. That he committed to Georgia Tech out of Roswell, Ga. — just 40 minutes from campus — made it that much sweeter for Key and his staff, who have prioritized in-state prospects.

“They’ve been with me since the very beginning,” Petty said. “(My) very first offer. They’ve been recruiting me ever since that day and that’s genuinely special for them to believe in me like that. What’s also special is coach Key. He’s a big part over there and his vision is very special. I’m bought in on it.”

Georgia Tech first offered Petty on Jan. 9, 2023, just a few days after Key made a pivotal hire to his new staff. Tim McFarlin is Georgia Tech’s director of high school relations. Before that, he was a four-time state champion as a mainstay in the Georgia high school ranks and, most recently, the head coach at Fellowship Christian School — where Petty plays and had just finished his sophomore season.

“There’s no question that Tim, he got the snowball rolling and it turned into an avalanche,” said John Thompson, now the head coach at Fellowship Christian and previously the head coach at East Carolina and defensive coordinator at Ole Miss, Florida, Arkansas and South Carolina.

“I’ve never seen anything like it in recruiting.”

Virginia Tech and Duke were the next two schools to offer. And then it really took off. In the spring of 2023, 70 schools came through Fellowship Christian. In the fall, 51 more showed up.

Georgia coach Kirby Smart arrived on campus in a chopper one day, Thompson said, which made some of the teachers cry with excitement.

“I’ve never seen it explode like that,” Thompson said. “I don’t know that you could name a school that has not recruited this guy.”

As Petty and his family started to narrow down his list, they gathered with Thompson at Fellowship Christian and ranked all of the schools in the mix on a whiteboard. They factored in education, development, coaching staff, campus life and —  to a lesser extent — a team’s offense. They went through this process three times at the school. The family also huddled in its garage, equipped with pens and paper. Petty and both of his parents each had their own column. If they liked a school, they’d give it a checkmark.

“The schools that made it out with three check marks,” Petty said, “were the schools that made it to the top five.”

Petty took official visits to all five of his finalists and recently swung by Georgia Tech and Florida State for another look. His sister will soon enroll at FSU as a freshman and the Seminoles received his final unofficial visit — a trip he said only “reassured” his feelings (in a good way) about Tallahassee.

Thompson, who has known FSU coach Mike Norvell for 30 years, said the Seminoles didn’t do anything wrong in Petty’s recruitment. Neither did Tennessee coach Josh Heupel or any of Petty’s other finalists in what ultimately became a smooth process.

“Recruiting gets a really bad connotation to it in a nasty sort of way,” Thompson said. “That did not happen one iota with Josh, and I totally mean that.

“Josh made the decision, and he made it with a lot of counsel and I’m sure a lot of prayer and he traveled a lot. He went to a lot of places, officially and unofficially. So his family really did it the right way. … He’s gonna be 17 years old on Monday. That’s unbelievable and with NIL and the way it is right now, it’s mindblowing. It is absolutely mindblowing. A year ago from right now he couldn’t drive yet.”

The decision came down to Petty’s comfort with both Georgia Tech and its coaches.

That’s where Key, a four-year starter at guard for the Yellow Jackets from 1997-2000, came in.

“He’s just straightforward,” Thompson said. “It was not the typical recruiting pitch about, ‘Hey, this is what we can do and this is what we are.’ He’s not a rah-rah guy. He’s powerful.

“I can remember sitting in and I’d been around him a little bit, but I hadn’t been around him a lot, and I’m saying, ‘This guy’s different. This guy’s really, really different than most coaches that come in.’ I was guilty of the same thing. You come in and you’ve got your recruiting spiel and you kind of go by the script. I don’t think Brent was going by the script. I think Brent went 100 percent by the heart.

Petty said a large part of Key’s pitch was the opportunity to stay home.

What most impressed Petty, though, was how Key’s actions followed his words. Of Georgia Tech’s 22 commits, 16 are from Georgia, including the seven-highest-ranked prospects in the class. Seeing four-star offensive tackle Damola Ajidahun of Duluth High commit on Aug. 3 was a particularly strong sign for Petty.

“(Key) is actually doing what he said he was going to do,” Petty said. “That’s a very good sign and that means a lot.”

Georgia Tech’s fan base did its part, too. Petty said he noticed how often fans would tweet #PettytoGT, and he appreciates what this moment means to both him and the program.

What are the Yellow Jackets getting in him?

“I’m gonna be mean, I’m gonna be aggressive, but I’m also gonna be smart and athletic, which I think a lot of people don’t know about my game,” Petty said. “I see the game, I like to think I do. I can tell when backers are blitzing. I can tell certain things … and I can start to pick up on tendencies like that and I think that’s the thing that’ll help that some people don’t really know about or don’t really see about my game.”

As Petty looks ahead to his senior season, he said his primary emotion is relief. He expects to receive far fewer text messages, although many schools will undoubtedly continue to recruit him.

Thompson is hopeful Petty’s stardom will continue to make Fellowship Christian — which plays at the Class AA level — a necessary stop on the recruiting trail.

In the meantime, there’s plenty to celebrate for the Petty family. Monday was also Petty’s 17th birthday.

“Recruiting was a blessing, there’s no doubt about that,” he said. “But I’ve served my time, I’ve been through that process — and I’m glad to come out on the other side.”

(Photo of Brent Key: Dale Zanine / USA Today)