Senior linebacker Jamez Harris and senior offensive tackle Tim Shaw, a pair of Bainbridge High School Bearcats first team All-Region 1-AAAAA selections, signed national football letters of intent Saturday with the West Georgia Technical College Golden Knights.

The two-year school, located in Waco, Ga., is beginning a new football program this year.

Looking on in the Bainbridge High School gymnasium’s hospitality room, as they signed with West Georgia Technical College, were their families and Bainbridge linebackers coach Kelvin Cochran. Cochran is also Harris’s uncle.

Also observing Harris’s signing were his mother Tangala Cochran, his grandfather Eddie Cochran, his aunt Rochelle Cochran and his brothers Jamari Lee and K.J. Cochran.

Looking on as Shaw signed were his mother Tammie Shaw, his grandmother Dollie Emanuel, his brother Trevon Shaw and coach Cochran.

Harris had 92 tackles — 62 solo and 30 assisted — eight tackles for a loss and one forced fumble. He won the Tommy Smith Hustle Award, the top honor a Bearcats football player can receive.

The Smith Award is named for Navy Lt. j.g. Thomas Livingston Smith Jr., who died Nov. 27, 1961, while staying with his plummeting disabled aircraft to steer it away from a densely populated area near the Naval Air Station in Atsugi, Japan.

The award goes annually to a Bearcat player who demonstrates the same qualities of character, leadership, academic achievement and hustle that Smith demonstrated.