Baylor coach Matt Rhule: Georgia is ‘by far’ best defense we’ll face
By SDS Staff
Published:
The Baylor Bears were No. 2 in the Big 12 in scoring offense this season, averaging 35.2 points per game. Baylor coach Matt Rhule is well-aware that his squad is in for a huge challenge trying to score on the Georgia defense, which allows an SEC low of only 12.5 points per game on average.
“Defensively, this is by far the best defense we’ve faced,” Rhule said at the Tuesday Sugar Bowl coaches press conference. “And that’s no disrespect to people in our conference. There’s a lot of great defenses in our conference, and there’s a lot of difficult defenses in our conference.”
It turned out to be a subject Rhule was ready to talk about. He elaborated on the differences between SEC defenses and Big 12 defenses.
“As a fan of college football, I’ve enjoyed this week seeing the different styles — not this week, the preparation, watching the different teams in the SEC,” Rule said.
“Last year we played Vanderbilt. You hear a lot about SEC versus this conference versus that conference. But it’s like night and day the styles of football we see. Really, the only Big 12-type team in the SEC that I watched of the teams I watched was really LSU.”
Preparing for Kirby Smart’s scheme presents some unique challenges for Rhule’s Bears.
“It will be interesting to see the different styles,” Rhule said. “We’re two teams that held each other under 20 points a game. And we do it with three-down. They do it four-down. I think Coach Smart is brilliant in what they’re doing.
“They play so many different guys on defense. They have different packages. They rotate in and out. I told our guys, our coaches, when they are game planning and taking notes, I said, guys, you have no idea what they’re going to do until the first snap of the game because they do something different every game. Certainly, one of the best defenses. They have got great, great players. They play hard. They play a lot of guys. It should be a really fun game. I think it’s really cool to see the different styles. And we’ll see what happens.”
Saturday Down South reports and comments on the news around the Southeastern Conference as well as larger college football topics.
