Sonny Smart, Father of Georgia Coach Kirby Smart, Dies After Fall, Surgery in New Orleans

Smart coached high school football in Georgia for 15 years.

Georgia coach Kirby Smart celebrates with his dad Sonny Smart after a NCAA college football game between Tennessee and Georgia in Athens, Ga., on Saturday, Nov. 5, 2022. Georgia won 27–13. / Joshua L. Jones / USA TODAY NETWORK

Sonny Smart, the father of Georgia football coach Kirby Smart and a regular presence at Bulldogs football games, died early Saturday morning, the program announced in a statement.

The elder Smart fell in New Orleans on New Year's Eve, ahead of Georgia's College Football Playoff Game against Notre Dame at the Sugar Bowl. He underwent surgery to repair a fractured hip, but died from complications after the procedure.

“The Smart family expresses their heartfelt gratitude to the Ochsner hospital and medical staff for the exceptional care provided to Sonny," the statement says. "Additionally, they ask for your continued prayers for those affected by the tragic events that occurred in the early hours of New Year’s Day."

Sonny Smart grew up in Columbia, Ala., just over the Chattahoochee River from Georgia, and played football at the collegiate level at Samford, where he was a center. He moved to Georgia, coaching at Bainbridge High School and Rabun County High School from 1988 to '03, posting a record of 90-78-1.

Kirby Smart once said to me about his father, Sonny: "I know people probably don't think a high school coach could steer the way you run a college program like Georgia's. But that's only because they don't know my Dad and saw how he ran our high school teams." pic.twitter.com/E3DsA3MaKU

— Ryan McGee (@ESPNMcGee) January 4, 2025

Kirby played for his father at Bainbridge before embarking on his college career at Georgia. Ahead of the 2023 national championship game against TCU, he credited his father for teaching him many of the most important lessons he's learned in coaching.

“He's taught me so much just about the way you handle things, the right way, the wrong way,” Smart said, per the Athens Banner-Herald. “Control the controllables. The moment's never too big if you're prepared. And I always watched the way he prepared our teams and our staff in high school."

"He was a very wise man, a man of few words. I tried to follow his mantra as a coach. I've certainly evolved from going to coach for other people, but a lot of my core beliefs came from the way he ran our programs in high school."

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