Former University of Georgia football coach and athletics director Vince Dooley died Friday, just a day before the annual renewal of the Georgia-Florida football rivalry.
Dooley, 90, passed away peacefully at his home with his wife and their four children present, the university announced in an official statement.
Dooley coached the Bulldogs from 1964 through 1988 and served as athletic director from 1979 to 2004.
His tenure included a national championship in 1980, when the team was led by freshman sensation Herschel Walker at running back.
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Dooley became the winningest football coach in Georgia history with 201 victories. Besides the national title, his teams also won six Southeastern Conference titles.
He is a member of the College Football Hall of Fame as well as both the Georgia and Alabama halls of fame, having played quarterback at Auburn University in the early 1950s and later served as an assistant coach.
Dooley was hospitalized briefly earlier this month with what was described as a mild case of COVID but had declared himself fully recovered, the Associated Press reported.
Dooley also appeared earlier this month in a campaign ad for Walker, now a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
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