For as much is the same for the Georgia Tech offense ahead of the 2025 season, there is significant difference - especially up front in the trenches.
Tech’s offensive line will have a few new pieces stepping into important roles. Right tackle Jordan Williams and center Weston Franklin graduated after the 2024 season and left tackle Corey Robinson transferred to Arkansas, leaving three holes to fill in its future starting lineup.
“Not as hard as everybody would think with a lot of new faces,” Tech quarterback Haynes King said in regard to the process of integrating a new-look offensive line. “With a good competition there it pushes everybody, whether it’s physically or mentally. That’s the two main parts when you’re adding new faces, when you’re stressing everybody physically and mentally, everybody’s just gonna improve at a rapid pace. The communication on and off the field has really been good.”
Losing three starters up front may not be as dire for Tech as it first reads.
Sophomore Ethan Mackenny (6-4, 310) has played 702 snaps over two seasons at left tackle for the Jackets and started the Birmingham Bowl in December. The Lassiter High School graduate was a freshman All-American (named by ESPN and On3) and made eight starts in 2023 before his 2024 was slowed by injury.
Harrison Moore, a 6-foot-5, 290-pound sophomore, is in line to take over at center. The Texan played a variety of roles in 2024, his first at Tech, logging 184 snaps over nine games.
To Moore’s left will be veteran Joe Fusile at guard, a 6-foot-6, 315-pound junior entering his fourth season with the program. To Moore’s right resides senior Keylan Rutledge (6-4, 310) who, according to Pro Football Focus, was Tech’s second-best pass blocker in 2024.
That leaves the right tackle spot up for grabs where freshman Jameson Riggs (6-6, 310) is the front-runner this spring.
“At right tackle now it’s a little bit by committee trying to figure out who can take over (Williams’) role,” Tech offensive line coach Geep Wade said after the Yellow Jackets practice Tuesday. “That’s a position right now that I’m not saying we’re worried about, but that’s a position we gotta hone in and figure out who’s gonna take that position.”
Tech’s depth on the offensive front appears to be in good standing should one of its starters succumb to injury between now and August (or after).
Freshman Josh Petty (6-6, 260), Tech’s highest-ranked recruit in the 2025 signing class, is among the two-deep at left tackle. Tana Alo-Tupuola (6-1, 310), Kevin Peay (6-4, 310), Jordan Floyd (6-6, 315), Ben Galloway (6-4, 310), Peyton Joseph (6-4, 315), North Carolina transfer Andrew Rosinski (6-5, 280) and Copiah-Lincoln Community College transfer Jokolby Jones (6-4, 285) are just a few of the other prominent linemen vying to climb the depth chart.
“We tell our guys every day, youth is not an excuse,” Wade said. “We’ve got to have game reps out here at practice, walk-throughs. Every reps is invaluable to those guys because they are talented. But we’ve got to mature at a faster rate because before you know it it’s gonna be August. Whether you’re getting reps with the 1s or the 2s, to me that does not matter right now. We’re not game planning so we’re not trying to put right now, necessarily, the best five. Right now we’re just trying to get better.”
Wade has been joined on the sideline this spring by Mike Polly, Tech’s new assistant offensive line coach who spent the 2024 coaching high school football after 11 seasons at Middle Tennessee.
With Wade, Polly and Tech coach Brent Key, a former offensive line coach and offensive lineman for the Jackets during his playing career, the Tech program continues to build itself around the play of its big bodies along the line of scrimmage.
“A ton of great offensive line minds in this building,” Fusile said. “Its been fantastic and I couldn’t be happier with the guys we have now. Getting better at football, it’s almost like solving a puzzle where you need different perspective to get through some things at times and it’s been great having both (Wade and Polly) in the room.”
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