Vonn Bell played his first two seasons at Chattanooga Central, then transferred to Ridgeland, a northwest Georgia school that had won just one state playoff game when Bell showed up at the door in 2011.
As a junior and senior with the Panthers, Bell did pretty well for himself. So did Ridgeland, which in 2012 became the first north Georgia mountain school to reach the state finals since Dalton in 2001 and would've been the first to win since 1967.
Bell was an AJC Super 11 pick, an Under Armour All-American and a five-star recruit. As a senior, he had 146 tackles and 1,700 all-purpose yards.
That was just the start for a player who might be the best ever to come out of the Georgia mountains.
Bell was a first-team All-American at Ohio State, where he would win a national title. A second-round pick in the 2016 NFL Draft, Bell now roams the secondary for the New Orleans Saints.
Here are GHSF Daily's picks as the best players in the history of the current Region 6-AAAA schools.
*Gilmer: John Davis (1982)
*Heritage (Ringgold): Justin Adekoya (2011)
*LaFayette: Jeff Suttle (1979)
*Northwest Whitfield: Sean Young (1999)
*Pickens: Shannon Brooks (2014)
*Ridgeland: Vonn Bell (2012)
*Southeast Whitfield: Roy Curtis (1979)
Best player in school history series
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