ATLANTA – Another football celebrity with ties to the University of Georgia may be headed for a political race, as former University of Tennessee head coach Derek Dooley weighs a run for U.S. Senate.
The son of legendary Bulldogs coach Vince Dooley said he is considering an effort to take on Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff next year.
Dooley said he may run in the Republican primary, in news first reported by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
“Georgia deserves stronger, common-sense leadership in the US Senate that represents all Georgians and focuses on results – not headlines,” Dooley said in a statement his spokesman shared with Capitol Beat News Service. “I believe our state needs a political outsider in Washington – not another career politician – to cut through the noise and partisanship and get back to real problem-solving.”
Dooley was the head coach for the University of Tennessee until he was fired over a decade ago after a losing streak. He continued coaching college and NFL football over the next decade.
He wouldn’t be the first football name to pursue a political career in Georgia, particularly in the U.S. Senate. In 2022, Donald Trump backed former Bulldog Herschel Walker’s bid for the Senate, leading to a sound defeat by Democrat Raphael Warnock.
The GOP road to the Senate seat is wide open after Gov. Brian Kemp, who had been considering a run against Warnock, backed off last month.
U.S. Rep. Buddy Carter, R-St. Simons, was the first major political figure to jump into the race, followed a month later by John King, the elected state insurance and safety fire commissioner.
“This is going to be the most watched, most expensive race in the United States,” King said Friday of the contest against Ossoff, while speaking at the state Republican party convention in Dalton.
Dooley will decide whether to enter the race soon. “My family and I are continuing conversations,” he said, “and will make a decision in the coming weeks.”
Dooley walked on in football at the University of Virginia and earned a scholarship as a wide receiver. He earned a law degree from the University of Georgia and briefly practiced law in Atlanta before working his way up the college coaching ladder, becoming head coach for three years at Louisiana Tech and then moving on to Tennessee.
Dooley recorded three consecutive losing seasons in Knoxville before he was fired in 2012 after losing to in-state rival Vanderbilt.
After that, he has worked as an assistant coach for the NFL’s Miami Dolphins and Dallas Cowboys, the University of Missouri and the New York Giants. Most recently, Dooley was an offensive analyst with the University of Alabama.