ALABAMA
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — The Alabama-Georgia rematch is still a couple of weeks away, but it’s never too early to look ahead.
The Crimson Tide and Bulldogs will meet in the SEC Championship Game on Dec. 1 in a rematch of the national championship game last season.
Georgia is one of a small group of teams some analysts believe has a shot of making things interesting with Alabama, but here are five things Alabama is definitely doing better than the Bulldogs.
Scoring points
Alabama is No. 3 in the country and No. 1 in the SEC in scoring offense with 48.6 points per game. That’s down a bit after being held to under 30 points the past two games, but it’s still much better than Georgia. The Bulldogs are scoring 37 points per game, which ranks third in the SEC. While that might not seem like a huge difference, it just illustrates that there are level different levels of explosive. Georgia has an explosive offense by SEC standards. But Alabama’s is and has been one of the best in the entire country all season.
Beating LSU
This one is mostly fun, but if we’re looking at common opponents, the one that jumps out is LSU. Alabama went into Baton Rouge at night and stomped LSU 29-0.
LSU’s defense fought hard, but LSU’s offense had no success against Alabama.
Georgia, however, went into Death Valley and had little to no success offensively in a 36-16 loss. The game was more lopsided than the final score. Georgia was down 16-0 at halftime and never recovered. LSU’s defense stifled Georgia’s offense all afternoon.
Sacking the quarterback
Alabama leads the SEC and is tied for No. 3 in the country with 36 sacks. On the flip side, Georgia is last in the SEC with 14 sacks.
That was a surprising discrepancy when comparing numbers for the two teams.
Alabama’s Isaiah Buggs (9.5) and Christian Miller (7.5) have more combined than Georgia’s entire team.
Even if you make that case that maybe Georgia isn’t putting an emphasis on sacking the quarterback, that’s still a low number for a top-5 team. If Tua Tagovailoa is given time in the pocket, he will pick a defense a part. He proved last year that he could pick apart Georgia.
Get tackles for loss
Alabama is No. 2 in the SEC with 82 tackles for loss. Georgia is last in the league with 40 tackles for loss. How is that even possible considering the caliber of athlete Georgia recruits each year?
Alabama’s defensive line has wreaked havoc all year, stopping run games in the backfield and sacking the quarterback. It’s unclear why Georgia’s sack and tackle for loss numbers are so low, but that doesn’t bode well against an explosive Alabama offense.
Intercept passes
Both teams had to rebuild their secondary, but Alabama’s reconstruction has gone a lot better. Alabama is second in the SEC with 13 interceptions, behind only LSU (16). Georgia has only intercepted 5 passes. Alabama has returned nearly that many for touchdowns (4). Georgia has only scored a touchdown off one of its interceptions.
Looking at a lot of these numbers, Georgia’s defense doesn’t appear to be as stout as it was when the Dawgs won the SEC and made the national championship game last season.
1. Yep. Bama has looked like a Big 12 offense with an Alabama Defense
2. Yep. Obvious
3. Yep. And it starts and ends with the interior of the line. UGA has been lackluster and it allows for defenses to focus on UGA’s edge rushers and single block the interior.
4. See number 3.
5. Yep. And a lot of that has to do with 3 and 4. QBs throw more INTs when they are under pressure.
Bama is heads and shoulders above us but we are a lot younger all around so hopefully in a year or 2 it’ll be closer to even
Bama is a young team also.
I honestly think you’ll be surprised at the score in atlanta. its gonna be closer than people think
UGA’s defense has yet to produce the explosive plays (SKs, TFLs, INTs) that you need in order to impose your will on an opponent. If they somehow address that in the next 2 weeks, they could potentially give Bama a game.
We had it at the beginning of the season with the early turnovers, but it’s faded away.
Heck, this article could have been 1 sentence… Everything but Special Teams. UGA is just too young to compete with Alabama this year. But they still have to play to the game, anything can happen.
I totally agree
UGA will be ready to play. I don’t wanna hear all that stat stuff. They run it well, Fromm is a accurate passer, they’re top 10 in scoring defense, and the kicker is 10x better than ours.
I don’t think we will win, but if we can slow down Tua, it should be a good a game. If LSU Jake Fromm shows up than we have 0 chance and might get blow out, but if the Jake Fromm of late shows up than who knows what can happen, especially if Tua isn’t 100%.
We have no chance and I’m not sure why we are going to show up……if you believe the stats and betting line.
#1 The Tide has been better at winning SEC Championships than UGA. #2 The tide has been better at winning National Championships than UGA.
Honestly that is a dumb blowhard point but nice try – thanks for making us look like we don’t have valid arguments as bama fans
You’re not a Bama fan… You’re a UGA fan that has been pretending to be a Bama fan since the NC game… Your post history gives you away… All you do is talk about UGA….
It’s all about the trenches. Kirby, more than any other former Saban assistant, knows this well. Can Georgia do what State did? If so, it’s a four quarter game. If not, Bama will be up by two or more scores before you know it. They have the athletes to do it but the production hasn’t been there. There’s only two weeks to, um, turn the tide. We’ll see.
Between UGA and MSU I feel as if MSU has the better D-line. I dont see UGA generating the pressure that MSU was able to do. The MSU D-line has played well most of the season but their Offense has cost them.
Oh, I agree. State’s DL has been the best Bama has faced this season and will probably stay that way until the postseason. And they’ll get the issues corrected and hopefully Tua will learn to check it down more often and take the four or five yard passes. I feel much more confident in Bama’s OL getting its issues corrected than I do Georgia’s DL suddenly resembling State’s or Bama’s. And speaking of Bama’s DL, that’s going to be a tall order for Georgia’s OL. I imagine their offense will try to get the ball on the perimeter and out of Fromm’s hands fast in an afternoon to neutralize Bama’s DL. Especially Q Williams.
**in an attempt
Wow ppl really didn’t see the LSU uga game reality – it was more lopsided than a 20 point loss?!?!? Haha yea the stats weren’t far off but sure buddy – ppl are fcking stupid – and his reference was that it was 16-0 at half – clearly doesn’t know 16 is less than 20
Why are you pretending to be a Bama fan?… You’re clearly a UGA fan… You can come out of the closet…
He must be. And must not have watched that LSU/Georgia game. LSU dominated that game in the trenches. They rushed for 275 yards. You don’t rush for that much unless you’re manhandling the other team’s DL. And if 275 rushing yards isn’t far off from 116 rushing yards, I’d hate to see what he thinks would be far off.
He is definitely a UGA fan. Most of his posts are in defense of UGA or somehow about UGA.
To be the best, you gotta beat the best and in my opinion, Bama is the best and beating them simply ain’t happening this year. MAYBE next year because UGA is simply much younger and less experienced than the Kings of the SEC. As far as the post of Bama being as young a team as UGA, that’s simply not close to true and you can look it up by starting rosters to verify. Bamas’ starting 22 is comprised of a good bit more juniors and seniors than UGA so maybe next year we can catch up but only time will tell.
The biggest difference is the D-lines. That’s the one place where Ga has not recruited as well, and it clearly shows in the run defenses, TFL, etc.
Ga needs to get the O-line healthy, to have any chance. It’s unreal how many starts those guys have missed. They are building great depth for next year, but it’s really hurting the continuity right now.
With the roster consisting of 68.5 percent freshmen and sophomores, they’re doing about as good as anybody could expect. Those highly ranked recruiting classes are finally starting to produce real depth at almost every position, but they really lack enough experience at this point. Next year and beyond, the days of lacking enough depth will become a thing of the passed.
Go Dawg’s!
If you want to say young as in actual age then y’all are probably right. Experience is something else though. The defense only returned 4 starters and only 2 started more than 1/2 the games. Only Williams is starting in the same position as last year in the line and the QB is starting his first year. After 10 games of experience you shouldn’t use the young excuse. The game will be great. Last thought, Georgia vs LSU has nothing to do with the SECCG. Different day, different officials, different teams. Hell, the Dawgs today are not the Dawgs of them. Same team that gave up 31 to Arky is the same today.
Sorry, meant to show that teams grow and change. I wanted to show how the tide grew after Arky.
We got it and it was a good point.
You still gotta play the game!