MIDWAY – From hitching rides with their godparents to seeing photos of their father on the recreation department walls to escaping war-torn countries to giving up monumental home runs, the memories and recognitions flowed from the Liberty County Athletic Hall of Fame’s class of 2026 inductees.

Basketball stars Freddie McSwain and Willie Williams and multi-sport standouts Sultan Cooper and Richard LeCounte III were enshrined in the Hall of Fame on Thursday evening during a ceremony at the Liberty County Community Complex in Midway. Also inducted was the 2016 First Preparatory Christian Academy boys basketball state championship team.

For McSwain, even getting to Liberty County for the ceremony seemed a longshot a few weeks ago. The former Liberty County High and Indiana University star was playing basketball for a team in Lebanon as conflict broke out in the Middle East.

His agent has assured him of finding a safer place to play for his next stop.

“Basketball has taken me all over this world,” McSwain said, “but this moment, this here, is something special. Liberty County, the whole community, you raised me. No matter where basketball has taken me, home will always be home. I hope my journey continues and can inspire the next generation coming up.”

Drafted into the NBA’s G League out of Indiana in 2018, McSwain has played internationally across the globe, including Brazil, Canada, Finland, Germany, Luxembourg, Japan, China, Saudia Arabia, Mexico and Austria, his high school coach, Willie Graham, pointed out. And McSwain can make it back to Liberty County, he makes a point of stopping by to see his old coach, Graham added.

“He spends a lot of time with the kids,” Graham said, “and if you can’t help but love him if you ever met him and talked to him.”

McSwain offered his gratitude to his coaches and teachers for believing in him and pushing him and to God and his mother.

“Thank you for the sacrifices and the prayers and the unconditional love,” he said.

Basketball allowed Willie Williams to travel the world, too, before he settled down again in Liberty County.

Williams acknowledged his first love was football and it was tough to get that sport out of his system, even in junior college.

“I was still in that learning process of playing basketball,” he said, even as his JUCO coach threatened to send him home to get the football out of him. “I was an aggressive player.”

It was during a drill one day at practice where Williams, a rising defensive back prospect who spurned offers to play college football, went helmet-to-helmet with one of the best running backs in the state, his own Bradwell Institute teammate, John Stewart.

Stewart got up and went back to his huddle. Williams didn’t.

“I stayed on the ground,” Williams said.

It was the result of having three vertebrae knocked out of place.

“That changed the story of me wanting to be a football player,” he said. “It was a bittersweet moment.”

Williams expressed his thank to the late Clifford Johnson for encouraging him to play football and play the “sport I really loved.”

Williams didn’t make the JV squad as an eighth grader, he came back the next year, now taller and at the insistence of Coach Gary Mistovich, he stayed on the JV squad and became the MVP. The next year, he got pulled up to the varsity to help the Tigers reach deep into the state playoffs.

Now the owner of commercial cleaning and detailing businesses, Williams recalled the work ethic he learned from his mother, Mamie Halsell, who worked three jobs. He also fondly recalled his godfather taking him to and from practice and conveyed his gratefulness for the many others in his life, such as H.C. Baker.

“I want to thank God for blessing me with a work ethic and athletic ability,” Williams said. “I want to thank my mom and stepfather for all their love and support and belief in me. I want to thank my family and friends. Hard work ethic and teamwork will pay off.”

Sultan Cooper’s longtime coaching colleague Otis King called the record-setting Bradwell quarterback – who also played football and baseball at BI before starring as a quarterback at Albany State University – the “greatest husband” and the “greatest father” he knows.

Cooper thought about the day he met Bradwell’s new football coach, Ross New. Cooper was going to be a senior that fall and the starting quarterback. That day, they met at a baseball game. Cooper was pitching. Statesboro’s Keith LeGree was hitting, and the future third-round pick of the Minnesota Twins belted a ball that sailed out of Harvey Overton Bradwell Booster Club Field and on to the roof of what was then the Liberty County Board of Education office.

From that inauspicious meeting, though, Cooper led Bradwell to a region football title and eventually to a state playoff game against Colquitt County, a loss that still lingers with Cooper.

“Thank you for seeing something in me that I didn’t see in myself,” Cooper said of New. “You pushed me beyond what I thought where my limits. You helped shape me into the man and the coach I would later become.”

Cooper was on the sidelines in 2021 when his son Sultan Cooper Jr. led Fitzgerald to the Class AA state football championship beating Thomasville 21-7. Thomasville, when it was named the national high school champion in the 1970s, was coached then by Jim Hughes. Hughes coached Colquitt County the night the Packers topped Cooper and his fellow BI Tigers.

His Hall of Fame honor belongs as much to his wife, Gwendolyn, as it does to him, Cooper said, and he also praised his mother, who taught him discipline.

Cooper highlighted and thanked the long list of coaches and teammates he had throughout his tenure at Bradwell.

“Bradwell has always been a special to me,” he said. “Everywhere I played or coached, I carried the Tiger brand with pride. Everything I accomplished as a player and a coach started right here. It didn’t just prepare me for competition, it prepared me for life.”

Cooper also paid tribute to his fellow Bradwell Institute quarterbacks before him and after him, including Raymond Gross, Mike Hughes, the late Anthoney Major, Tracy Flournoy, Alfred Lester and Frank Troup, and other BI standouts, such as Donnie Woods, Tony Brown and Willie Williams.

“You set the standard and built the foundation I had the privilege to walk on,” he said. “The game doesn’t belong to one generation. It grows because we had something to do with it.”

For his teammates in all sports, Cooper laid out his praise and respect. He cited many of his past teammates, including Mayor Karl Riles, Jon C. Byrd, Greg Williams, Rico Larsen, Randolph Butler, Bob Moorer, Allen Dykes, Garrett Landers, Johnny Bethany, Eddie Wells, Phil Swint, Dupree Green, Wayne Browning and Wesley Crystal.

“This honor has my name on it, but it was all of you,” he said. “I always tried to earn your respect every day. We fought together. We celebrated together. And we learned together. Some of the greatest memories and lessons came from the locker room and on the field and in the trenches with you guys. Thank you for making me better not just as a player but as a man.”

Cooper also called out the community at large and offered his praise for its work in helping build him.

“To Liberty County, the real Liberty County, together, we were a powerful combination,” Cooper said. “When we came together, the state of Georgia was on notice.”

“Thank you for this incredible honor. To be recognized along so many great individuals who have contributed so much to this community is truly humbling. I am grateful for your belief in my journey. It’s about the journey, the ups and the downs, the setbacks and the comebacks, and about the people who poured into me, about the discipline to keep showing up, even when it’s hard.

“Success is never a straight line,” Cooper continued. “But if you stay committed, stay committed and never forget your why, you can achieve more than you ever imagined. This honor is a reminder of what is possible when you are surrounded by great people and achieve a goal together. I stand here not just as an individual but as a reflection of everyone who has been a part of this journey with me. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of something bigger than myself.”

Derek Sills was an assistant coach at Swainsboro and had rebuffed job offers from both Liberty County High and Bradwell Institute. That is, until he came to Hinesville and saw a little league and asked who that player was and where was he going to school. He was told that was Richard LeCounte and he was headed to Liberty.

“So I called Kirk Warner the next day,” Sills said.

LeCounte played on the Liberty junior varsity as an eighth grader, and Sills implored Warner to put LeCounte on the varsity as a starting safety. Warner, acknowledging that doing so in a game would lead to a forfeit of that contest, turned down Sills’ request.

That following spring, with LeCounte on the field with the varsity for spring football, dozens of coaches from across the country were at Liberty’s workouts. They were there to see Raekwon McMillan, one of the nation’s top linebacker prospects. It didn’t take long for some, Sills noted, to notice LeCounte.

“I walk back to the fieldhouse and a car pulls up and it’s Kirby Smart, back when he was defensive coordinator at Alabama,” Sills said. “He said ‘I want to talk to you.’ I said, ‘I know y’all want Raekwon.’ He said, ‘no, I want to talk to you about number 4.’ I said, ‘coach, he’s in eighth grade. He took a bus over here. There’s some concern if he’ll even play football.’ He said, ‘you can tell his momma and daddy he can forget that basketball, he’s going to play in the NFL.’”

McMillan said he’s watched the young man he considers his little brother play every single snap of his career.

“Your family is my family,” McMillan said. “Your kids are my nephews. I appreciate all the time we spent the last 15 years to become who we are today.”

To LeCounte, it was walking into the recreation department and seeing the pictures of his father on the wall there that inspired him.

“So I said, ‘I’ve got to be somebody,’” LeCounte attested. “It’s been a long ride and I appreciate all of you. No matter where I go, I want to come back home and help. I love y’all and I love Liberty County.”

LeCounte, a fifth-round pick by the NFL’s Cleveland Browns in 2021, also expressed his gratitude to the community that supported him.

“I appreciate all the rides and talks I’ve been given,” he said. “It wasn’t just my work. It wasn’t just my parents. It was the whole community to help me become Richard LeCounte. I appreciate you having the patience.”

First Preparatory Christian Academy basketball coach Shane Smith also received the honor for his 2016 state championship team – and noted he was coming back in the future when the anniversaries for his back-to-back state titles came around and those teams were eligible for inclusion.

His 2016 team was his first state championship team as the head coach.

“When I think about that team, I don’t think championships,” he said. “I think about the journey – the long practices and a group of young men who chose discipline, toughness and a team over everything else. This group was special in how they responded adversity.”

There were trying moments – such as blowing a big halftime lead against Windsor Academy in the semifinals.

“I said, ‘listen, let’s not come out and shoot a bunch of 3s,’” Smith said of his halftime talk. “Sure enough, that’s exactly what they did.”

By the end of the third quarter, the lead was gone and early in the fourth quarter, the Highlanders were trailing. They closed, Smith noted, on a 26-13 run and proceeded to beat Furtah Prep for the state title in the next game.

“They taught me something as a coach,” he said. “They reminded me to never take a moment for granted. Because of this team, I became a better coach and the program became stronger.

“You set a standard that lives on today. Thank you for what you built.”