Brent Key says Fanning Center will be ‘a huge step’ for Georgia Tech athletics

On Monday, Georgia Tech and Tech athletics held a ceremonial groundbreaking for the Dr. Thomas A. Fanning Student-Athlete Performance Center.

The Fanning Center, to be constructed in Bobby Dodd Stadium’s northeast corner on the current site of the Edge Center, was approved by the Georgia board of regents in 2022. It was named for alumnus Thomas Fanning, who was present at the ceremony in the President’s Suite in the Bill Moore Student Success Center in Bobby Dodd Stadium.

“When I consider investments in athletics, when I look at all the other investments we made as a foundation or with personal giving, I think about the internal rate of return, the payback, the multiplicative power of any dollar invested in athletics,” Fanning said. “When we think about building the brand, when we think about contributing to the national reputation of this fine institute, it’s one of the best investments anybody can make. It is truly the front door of the institute.”

Tech athletic director J Batt said more than $85 million, “100 percent charitably gifted from generous individuals, partners and all sorts of leaders across our Georgia Tech athletics community,” was raised for the 100,000 square foot facility which will house offices and meeting spaces and a player’s lounge for the football program, as well as strength and conditioning space, a dining hall, nutrition rooms, sports science and data analytics areas and sports medicine and recovery rooms.

Credit: ELDON LINDSAY / Georgia Tech Athletics

Credit: ELDON LINDSAY / Georgia Tech Athletics

Credit: Photo: Georgia Tech Athletics

The Fanning Center will also have a sports science lab.

“This groundbreaking is for a building that will have an incredible impact on all of our student-athletes,” Batt said. “It is, in today’s changing environment, a statement about Georgia Tech athletics and what it means to our student-athletes. This facility will offer the top tier of care for sports medicine, sports science, strength and conditioning, nutrition, mental health support. It is a priority as we continue to grow and rebuild Georgia Tech athletics, that our student-athletes and their care and their development is at the very foundation of everything we do.”

Batt, Fanning, Tech president Angel Cabrera and Tech football coach Brent Key all spoke at the event which was attended by such dignitaries as Tech baseball coach Danny Hall, former Tech president Bud Peterson and former Tech basketball legend Brian Oliver. Oliver works for DPR Construction which is charged with erecting the Fanning Center.

Credit: ELDON LINDSAY / Georgia Tech Athletics

Credit: Photo: Georgia Tech Athletics

The Fanning project is expected to be completed in 2026. Demolition of the Edge Center has not yet begun, although work to clear and prep the interior of that building has been well underway.

“Buildings are nice, buildings are great, but it’s about what goes inside those buildings. It’s what those buildings provide for us that are special for the student-athletes here at Georgia Tech,” Key said of a facility that will greatly impact his program in particular. “Let’s not get it twisted here. We have two goals in the football program: No. 1 is to graduate our players and have them leave here better than they came. No. 2 is to win championships – that’s state championships and ACC championships. If we take care of those two, everything else will fall into place.

“(The Fanning Center) will provide us even more resources, even more technology, more space, all of those things to allow that to happen. It’s a huge step in both of those quests as a football program.”

Fanning was presented with a commemorative gold shovel to close the ceremony and attendees were gifted a mini gold shovel of their own.