Saturday is a day of firsts.

It’ll be the first time that Florida is outside the top 10 in Jacksonville since Dan Mullen took over in 2018. It’ll also be the first time that Georgia is the No. 1 team in the country facing Florida since 1942. Who could forget?

It could be the first time that Florida goes into November with 4 SEC losses since 2011. It could be the first time that Georgia goes into November with the East officially locked up since the league expanded to East and West divisions in 1992 (that would take Kentucky losing to Mississippi State).

Could Saturday also be the first Georgia loss? Or will it perhaps be the first time that Florida is held to single digits in the Mullen era? Let’s just say I think one of those firsts is more likely than the other.

These are my final thoughts ahead of Saturday’s showdown in Jacksonville:

1. Do we know which QB will play the most snaps? Does it matter?

We’re in Week 9, yet there’s a decent chance that both teams have 2 quarterbacks take meaningful snaps.

On the Florida side, I suppose that’s not earth-shattering because even with Kyle Trask, Mullen liked to bring in Emory Jones. The problem is that this year’s team obviously doesn’t have a Trask. It has an Anthony Richardson, AKA the rising redshirt freshman who is clearly more promising than Jones. Richardson did come back down to earth after returning from his early season injury, but he also just got to throw more passes (19) against LSU than he had in the rest of the season combined.

Mullen insists that it’s not about who starts, but rather who finishes. Meanwhile, the rest of us insist that it’s not about who has been in the system the longest, but rather who gives Florida the best chance to win. All signs point to Richardson being that guy, especially after Jones played his worst game of the year against LSU. Georgia’s all-world defense hasn’t seen a quarterback with Richardson’s abilities. Both Richardson and Jones are facing an uphill climb against Jordan Davis and Co., but the question is who can make those game-changing plays. We know the answer to that.

On the Georgia side, JT Daniels has been slowly working his way back from a lat injury for the last month. During that time, Stetson Bennett IV has re-converted skeptics like myself. Not many dudes can average 12.1 yards per attempt in a game, much less for half a season’s worth of games. The connection with Brock Bowers and Ladd McConkey is undeniable, and it’s part of the reason why nobody would be surprised if The Mailman got the majority of the reps.

Is Kirby Smart really about to tear a page out of Mullen’s playbook and periodically bring Daniels in for a random series or 2? If so, why? What Georgia is doing without Daniels is working. It has the biggest scoring differential in FBS and ranks No. 4 in yards per attempt.

In a perfect world, neither coach would fear the scenario that one of his top 2 signal-callers enters the transfer portal. Perhaps that’ll continue to factor into the rep distribution.

Personally, I’d have no problem if we saw Richardson and Bennett get every meaningful rep on Saturday.

2. The national sites are disrespecting Georgia’s defense

What do I mean by that? For whatever reason, we still don’t remove non-offensive touchdowns from points allowed per game. It’s silly. It’s outdated. We have 4K cameras that cost more than my house, yet we can’t figure out a way to remove non-offensive touchdowns from a defense’s statistical breakdown?

Go to a national stats website and it will tell you that Georgia is allowing 6.6 points per game. In the words of Dwight Schrute, “False.” UAB had a pick-6 against the Dawgs, which negates 7 of those 46 total points. Georgia’s defense has actually allowed 39 points. Divide that number by 7 games and, yep, that’s 5.6 points per game.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. Hey, what about 2001 Miami (FL), 2008 USC and 2011 Alabama as the only other Power 5 defenses to allow single-digit points per game in the 21st century? How many points did their defenses really allow if you take away non-offensive touchdowns?

  • 2001 Miami (FL) — 8.0 PPG allowed (subtract 3 non-offensive TDs)
  • 2008 USC — 9.0 PPG allowed (no non-offensive TDs to subtract)
  • 2011 Alabama — 6.5 PPG allowed (subtract 3 non-offensive TDs)
  • 2021 Georgia — 5.6 PPG allowed (subtract 1 non-offensive TD)

So that 6.5 points per game mark is the real number that Georgia should be shooting for. If the Dawgs won a national championship and played 8 more games with 7 points per game allowed the rest of the way, they would finish the season at 6.3.

Again, we’re only counting touchdowns that are actually scored against the defense. It’s baffling that I have to explain that.

3. Please don’t do the Brock Bowers-Kyle Pitts comp, Gary Danielson

I’m bracing for it. And look, I love what Bowers has turned into as a true freshman. It’s remarkable to think about his potential the next 2.5 years or so. There’s no denying that he has been a revelation.

But let’s not jump the gun and say that Bowers is on the level of 2020 Pitts. That’d be disrespectful to a guy who averaged 96 receiving yards and 1.5 touchdowns in 8 games against all SEC competition. Pitts put together one of the best seasons we’ve ever seen from a tight end, and not just because he put up numbers. He caught balls in triple coverage and defied what we thought was possible from a 20-year-old at the position (he was only 19 when the 2020 season started).

What I fear is that we’re going to do the thing where we show Pitts’ numbers as as true freshman when he never played in Mullen’s offense. He didn’t take off until his sophomore year, so yeah, obviously Bowers is going to have better numbers than the freshman version of Pitts. That doesn’t mean he has that same upside, though. We’re talking about one of the best pass-catching tight ends in college football history.

Let’s also not dismiss the fact that if Darnell Washington had started off the year healthy or if Arik Gilbert had been out there, Bowers likely wouldn’t have been afforded that opportunity. There’s no denying he made the most of that opportunity, but Bowers would’ve had a much smaller role if not for some injury luck that benefitted him.

Ok, I didn’t want this to be an anti-Bowers argument. It’s not. He’s phenomenal. Just wait a year or 2 to do the Pitts comp, Gary.

4. Now or never for Todd Grantham? It has to be

Florida’s defense is improved this year, but it’s probably not a good sign when your head coach calls your first-half defensive performance against Vanderbilt “awful.” The Commodores just couldn’t finish off drives. Georgia? Yeah, the Dawgs can finish off drives. And if they do, perhaps they’ll finish off Grantham’s time in Gainesville.

It’s not just that last year’s Florida defense was historically bad. It’s about what happens in these rivalry games. What would it say about Grantham if Bennett, who struggled in last year’s matchup against a lesser Florida defense, came back and lit up the Gators? That’s not exactly “bring me back for Year 5” type of stuff.

Grantham has taken no shortage of blame for his struggles against Georgia, even though his defense has actually improved in that matchup year over year. Still, though. This can’t be another game in which Georgia shreds Grantham’s defense on third down. That’s really where the Florida frustration with Grantham began when Jake Fromm diced up the Gators in 2018 and 2019.

Mullen brought Grantham back for Year 4 despite the outcry for him to make a change. This feels like Grantham’s last shot to salvage any remaining public support he’s got left.

5. I don’t know what to expect from Georgia’s receivers

Copy and paste that title for basically any game this season. Here’s the health of UGA’s wideouts for Jacksonville:

  • George Pickens, out with torn ACL
  • Dominick Blaylock, out with knee
  • Jermaine Burton, limited with groin
  • Arian Smith, limited with knee
  • Marcus Rosemy-Jacksaint, limited with ankle
  • Kearis Jackson, limited with knee

The good news, according to Smart, is that Georgia coming off the bye is actually healthier at receiver than it was going into the Auburn game. That says a lot. Jackson still hasn’t played 30 snaps in a game, and he was the team’s leading receiver last year. Does that mean his time is coming this weekend?

Outside of McConkey and Bowers, we really don’t know who will look like he’s at full speed. We know that Kaiir Elam is set to return for Florida, which isn’t ideal for whoever lines up on the outside for the Dawgs.

Whatever the case, Georgia has made it work so far with significant injuries in the pass-catching department. That theme could continue on Saturday.

6. Florida’s run game could shut down any last question about Georgia’s defense

If you want to follow the Danny Kanell script, you can try to downplay Georgia’s defensive greatness by saying that none of its opponents has had an elite offense. Never mind the fact that UGA allowed an average of 7.7 points in the last 3 games, all of which were against Top 25 opponents. That included a matchup with Chris Rodriguez Jr. and Wan’Dale Robinson, who entered as the league’s leading rusher and receiver … and UGA held them to a combined 62 yards on 24 touches.

So yeah, there’s nothing to prove here. At least, there shouldn’t be. Having said that, shutting down Florida’s No. 2 non-service academy rushing attack would be quite the statement.

Florida has been held to fewer than 170 yards just once, and it was the LSU game in which logic went out the window. The Gators are still a prolific rushing team with 2 mobile quarterbacks, along with the backfield trio of Dameon Pierce, Malik Davis and Nay’Quan Wright. Georgia, on the other hand, has allowed 1 rushing touchdown all year. On top of that, the best individual rushing performance against the Dawgs was by UAB’s DeWayne McBride, who mustered 61 yards on 13 carries.

My favorite Georgia stat? The Dawgs are the only Power 5 team that has yet to allow a run of 20-plus yards in conference play. That’s 147 carries against SEC competition, and not one of them went for 20. And on the year, including nonconference play, they have allowed just 1 run of 20-plus yards, which was a 23-yard run that happened with 15 seconds left in a 56-7 win against UAB.

Good luck, Florida.

And a prediction … Georgia 35, Florida 14

Selfishly for the sake of my own personal entertainment, I’d love a down-to-the-wire game in which we actually see Georgia’s defense look mortal. I just don’t expect that to happen. Until someone tells me that Davis, Jalen Carter and Nakobe Dean are regular human beings, I’m going to refuse to believe it.

Other than throwing logic out the window and saying this year is chaos, I can’t envision a scenario in which Florida strings together scoring drives. And on the flip side, we’ve seen the Gators struggle away from the friendly confines of The Swamp. They won’t benefit from getting some of those pre-snap issues that Alabama had in that thriller in Gainesville.

It’s also easy to forget that this is indeed a revenge game for Georgia. That loss prevented an experienced UGA team from playing for another SEC Championship, despite the fact that it was as talented as anyone in the country. I’d expect to see Florida hang around in the first half, but perhaps this game has a 2018 feel to it. That is, Georgia makes halftime adjustments and blows it out of the water.

Give me the Dawgs to continue a frustrating year for Mullen.

Something tells me we won’t get a Darth Vader costume from him this Halloween.