Former Avondale, Tennessee star Chip Kell dies at 75

Chip Kell, a former University of Tennessee football All-American who was an inaugural inductee into the Georgia High School Football Hall of Fame in 2022 for his days at Avondale in DeKalb County, has died at age 75.

Marvin West of KnoxTNToday.com was the first to report the news.

Kell was a star lineman for Avondale teams that never lost more than one game in a season in the 1960s. In track and field, he set an iconic state record in the shot put with a throw of 66 feet, 7 inches. The record stood 50 years.

At Tennessee, Kell became the first Georgian to be named a consensus All-American twice. He played briefly in the Canadian Football League before suffering a knee injury.

Kell was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2006, the Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame in 2009 and the University of Tennessee Athletics Hall of Fame in 2016. He was among the 45 original inductees in the Georgia High School Football Hall of Fame.

Kell became an educator and football coach. He was a former head football coach at Calhoun, Union County and Southeast Whitfield in Georgia and Hixson in Tennessee.

He was living in Cohutta in retirement.