LEGENDS CLASS OF 2024
TASHA BUTTS
At Baldwin High School in Milledgeville, Tasha Butts was the Georgia Girls Basketball Player of the Year in 2000. She headed to Tennessee for her college career where she was second team All-SEC-and drafted by the WNBA’s Minnesota Lynx. After one pro season, Tasha embarked on a coaching career. She held assistant positions at Duquesne, UCLA, LSU and Georgia Tech before landing at Georgetown as head coach in 2023. Unfortunately, Tasha was not able to see her team play its first game because she died before the season started at just 41 years old.
BILLY JOHNSON
Billy Johnson was a starting third baseman for the famed New York Yankees of the 1940’s. Raised in New Jersey, Johnson played minor league ball in Augusta before making the big league team in 1943. He batted .280 with 94 RBI’s as New York beat the Cardinals to win the World Series. Billy finished 4th in the American League MVP voting. In 1947 Johnson was an All-Star as the Yankees beat Brooklyn to again win the World Series. New York would claim two more Series titles before Johnson was traded to St. Louis where he finished his career.
BILL LUCAS
Bill Lucas went from player in the Atlanta Braves minor league system to one of the team’s top executives in a 10-year span. When Ted Turner purchased the team in 1976, he put Lucas in the unofficial role of general manager. Over the next 2 seasons, Lucas overhauled the Braves roster by drafting Bob Horner, Steve Bedrosian, and calling up Dale Murphy and Glenn Hubbard from the minor leagues. He also hired a new manager in 36 year old Bobby Cox. Unfortunately, Bill suffered a massive cerebral hemorrhage in 1979 and passed away at just 43 years of age.
DR. NATHANIEL THORNTON
Developing his game at the Atlanta Athletic Club in the early 1900’s, Dr. Nathaniel Thornton began racking up tennis titles all over the country. He graduated from Georgia Tech in 1903 and for the next 25 years, Nat would accumulate 38 different trophies. He teamed with Bryan Grant to win the Southern Tennis Championships in 1906 and the duo finished second at the National Tennis Championships in 1907. That tournament is now known as the U.S. Open. Nat also became a practicing dentist and died in 1975 at the age of 90.