PAUL JOHNSON
Head Coach
Overall Record: 189-99-0 (65.6%)
Georgia Southern University (1997-2001)
United States Naval Academy (2002-2007) 
Georgia Tech (2008-2018)

 
Paul and Susan Johnson were driving out to Arizona with their golden retriever when Georgia Tech athletic director J Batt texted to ask Paul if he had a few minutes to talk. Batt had just taken over as the Yellow Jackets' AD, and who better to tap into for insight on the place than Johnson, winner of four ACC Coastal division titles during his time in Atlanta?
 
"I didn't put two and two together," Johnson said of the call's timing. "He called me that morning and talked about all of my accomplishments, and I'm thinking, this is weird. And he goes, 'Well it certainly sounds like a Hall of Fame career to me.' And then it kind of hit me."
 
Johnson is officially a member of the College Football Hall of Fame, becoming the fourth former Yellow Jackets, the fifth Navy and the first Georgia Southern coach to make the Hall.
 
"Once you retire and have been out of it for a year or two, you think about those things, but not while coaching," Johnson said of his legacy. "It's a tremendous honor, and it's something I could have never dreamed of when I first started coaching. I was so fortunate to be around so many good people. Not only did I have the opportunity to work with a lot of good coaches and players, but good people."
 
Johnson went 62-10 at Georgia Southern, making the FCS playoffs in all five years and winning two national titles. But Statesboro was hardly the only place where Johnson made a lasting impact.
 
At Navy, he took over a program that had gone 1-20 in its previous two seasons and went 45-29, posting winning seasons in the final five of his six seasons there. The Midshipmen finished ranked No. 24 in both major polls in 2004. And in 2007, his final year, Johnson led Navy to a triple-overtime upset over Notre Dame, snapping a 43-game losing streak against the Irish. And perhaps most importantly, he went 6-0 against Army.
 
Johnson went 82-60 in 11 years at Georgia Tech, finishing ranked three different times. The Jackets finished No. 8 in the AP poll in 2014 after winning the Orange Bowl.
 
"On the field, probably my first national championship as a head coach at Georgia Southern," Johnson said of his best memories. "If you take one at each of the schools I was the head coach, at Navy it would be a tossup between going 11-1 against the other two academies when I was the head coach there; we never lost to Army. And also breaking the streak against Notre Dame. I can remember that day in South Bend. And then at Georgia Tech it would be winning in Athens and then winning the Orange Bowl (in 2014)."
 
Posting nearly 200 college victories via his triple-option offense, Johnson's high school ran the wishbone, although the future coach actually drew his offensive inspiration from his time on the defensive side of the ball. He was a 140-pound nose tackle in high school, and he did not play in college. He had coached the defensive line during his first stint at Georgia Southern, and he found the option as the hardest offense to defend against. He became the Eagles' offensive coordinator two years later, and his offense evolved from there, although those teams threw the ball much more than traditional option teams.
 
Johnson was inspired to get into coaching by Elmer Aldridge, his high school coach, who hired Johnson right out of Western Carolina. He saw the influence that Aldridge had on other people's lives, and Johnson wished to pay that forward.
 
"I got a lot of phone calls and a lot of texts," Johnson said of former players reaching out once he made the Hall. "That's special. You lose touch with some, but for years I thought the neatest thing about coaching was that you get a text or a call out of the blue and somebody says, 'Coach, I wanted to call you. I had my first child and was thinking about you.' That's what makes it worth doing. That's way more important than wins and losses."
 
With his trademark humor and blunt honesty, the 66-year-old Johnson is enjoying retired life now. He recalls a moment on the golf course with Clemson coach Dabo Swinney recently at the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl Challenge as the perfect encapsulation between being in the thick of coaching these days and being relatively stress-free.
Said Johnson: "We were on the cart and he has two phones and I've got a range finder, and I said, Which one of us is the retired guy?"
 
 
UP CLOSE:

• Overall Record: 189-99-0 (65.6%), including 82-60 at Georgia Tech; 45-29 at Navy and 62-10 at Georgia Southern.
• Led the Yellow Jackets to final national rankings in 2008 (No. 22), 2009 (No. 13), and 2014 (No. 8), nine bowl games and three ACC Championship games.
• Transformed a Navy program, which went 1-20 in the previous two seasons, to a 45-29 team the next six seasons while earning five bowl berths, a 6-0 record against Army and a victory over Notre Dame for the first time in 43 years.
• Won two FCS national titles, made five FCS playoff appearances, and won the Southern Conference every year while heading the Georgia Southern program.
• Coached 11 First Team All-Americans and was named ACC Coach of the Year three times, Southern Conference Coach of the Year twice and the AFCA NCAA Division I-AA National Coach of the Year twice.