Georgia Tech head coach Danny Hall talks with an umpire during an NCAA baseball game against Western Carolina on Sunday, May 4, 2025, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Vasha Hunt)

PARKERSBURG — The journey from Coolville in the Buckeye State to the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame is nearly complete for recently retired Georgia Tech baseball skipper Danny Hall.

The 1973 Federal Hocking graduate, who in 2023 was inducted into the American Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Fame, will be enshrined with 11 others on Saturday night during the 70th ceremony set for the Macon City Auditorium.

“It will be a big deal,” said Hall, who had the most coaching wins in school history and led Georgia Tech (1994-2025) to two dozen NCAA berths and three appearances in the College World Series. “I think someone told me there’s about 500 people who will attend. It will be a nice affair for sure.”

Hall’s record of 1,452-793-1 ranks ninth in NCAA history for career victories.

He was a five-time Atlantic Coast Conference Coach of the Year and earned the same honors twice in the Mid-American Conference while leading Kent State.

“I grew up over there in Coolville, Ohio and I was born in Weston, W.Va. My mom and dad both went to Glenville State,” Hall said. “My dad played football and baseball at Glenville State and then coached me literally my whole high school career in football and baseball.

“Kind of grew up in the hills there of Athens County, but it’s just great experience and Parkersburg was right there. I did play one summer over there in City Park. I can’t remember the name of the team I was on, but I played against Steve Swisher. Back in the day he was Parkersburg South. He was just a tick older than me. For years my dad was telling me how good Nick Swisher was and he was right.”

Hall still has family in the area. His mother, a retired elementary school teacher and former basketball coach at Federal Hocking, lives in Coolville. His sister resides in Amesville.

“I have 100% been blessed, but it all started right there in Coolville and just hanging out, following my dad in gyms and on fields for a lot of years,” Hall admitted. “He started a little league team there in Coolville when I was 8 years old and I told people this — so for 62 straight years I had a baseball uniform on at some point in time in the year. Whether it was from little league to Georgia Tech and then playing in college at Miami University there in Ohio. It was just a blessing to be able to do that for so long.”

Despite his retirement from the dugout, Hall has found a way to stay busy on a couple of fronts with the ACC Network Extra (ACCNX) and BIP Wealth.

“It’s a company that I think was kind of launched in 2007 and they had managed my money for literally almost the whole time I was at Georgia Tech,” explained Hall. “When I retired I literally gave them my 401K and I’m like ‘alright, keep it working here’ and so long story short they have a baseball division that manages money for over 120 pro baseball players, and some college players.

“I’m not necessarily in that division, but I’m in what they call ‘business development role.’ All I do, like this morning, I had breakfast with an ex-player of mine. I probably haven’t been around the guy too much for 10 years and so it was just talking to him and seeing where he’s at with financial planning and if it’s something our company can help him with then I’m going to have him meet with a personal wealth advisor.”

The good news for Hall is the local office for BIP Wealth is only five minutes from his house.

“The company is growing and they manage money for over I think 3,000 families, but we do have that baseball division and it was started by a guy named Jim Poole, who pitched in the major leagues and pitched at Georgia Tech and unfortunately he passed away from ALS a couple years ago,” he said.

Hall is equally excited about the ACCNX.

“They’ll stream games and so I am broadcasting most of the Saturday games down there. Last weekend I made my broadcasting debut,” Hall said of the ESPN app. “They played Bowling Green and they swept Bowling Green.

“They’ve got a really good team. Like the team that we had last year was very young and we were able to secure most of that team with some NIL money, so they’ll have a great chance to make a great run this year throughout the season in college baseball.”

Hall’s coaching tenure spanned an interesting time as he was around long before the advent of players earning money through Name, Image and Likeness.

“The whole NIL thing. The landscape has totally changed in college athletics,” Hall explained. “Baseball players, particularly at the highest level, are able to kind of capitalize on that Name, Image and Likeness, and then depending on the school they can get revenue sharing money.

“It’s good for baseball because the baseball player forever was just on partial scholarship. Now guys can live pretty comfortably. That’s how I would say it. If you’re a great player you are going to get paid a lot of money to play college baseball these days.”

What hasn’t changed about Hall throughout the decades is his dedication to the sport he loves.

He’s also one that’s not going to forget his roots anytime soon.

“I was up there kind of right before Christmas to see my mom and my sister and then I was also up there this summer, and then ironically enough the lady who was when I coached at Kent State, the lady that was our academic advisor is Cathy O’Donnell. She lives in Belpre,” Hall said. “Funny story when I was seeing my mom she had to go to Belpre for something and I drove her. We ate at a Mexican restaurant so I said ‘hey, I know that Rod and Cathy live right on the river here.

“Let’s see if we can find them so I found the address in my phone. We were kind of driving back down there and I go ‘well, that’s Cathy O’Donnell right there outside of her house’ so we pulled in and surprised them so to speak. It was great to see them. Rod was great and obviously the track coach when I was at Kent State and then Cathy, personally, was the academic advisor for baseball.”

Aside from Hall, the 70th Georgia Sports Hall of Fame class also includes John Kasay, Morgan Burnett, Bunny Fuller Harris, Chaunte Lowe, Alvin Copeland, Patsy Neal, Tim Willis, Nate Hirsch, Ray Cutright, George Maloof and Dr. Leah Brown.

After finding out he was going to be inducted the ex-Lancer started looking into its storied history.

“The first guy on the list is Hank Aaron, and so OK, so you go Hank Aaron and you go Kevin Brown, and you know Kevin Brown pitched at Georgia Tech,” Hall said when he began perusing the baseball list. “The first 100-million dollar player in the major leagues. Bobby Cox. Tom Glavine. Chipper Jones.

“You know, Brian McCann, Dale Murphy, Phil Niekro, Jackie Robinson, John Smoltz and you know, I’m just looking at that and for me it’s just kind of a humbling experience to be put into a hall of fame where there is such, not only in baseball, but the football and basketball list is crazy, too.”

Contact Jay Bennett at jbennett@newsandsentinel.com