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Former UGA coach Mark Richt reflects on 2007 ‘gator stomp’ celebration penalty
By Cody McClure
Published:
Former Georgia and current Miami head football coach Mark Richt reflected back this week on Georgia’s 2007 celebration penalty against Florida.
Georgia’s Knowshon Moreno leaped in for a touchdown to give the Bulldogs a 7-0 lead in that ’07 contest, and moments later, the entire Bulldogs bench ran onto the field to celebrate with Moreno and do the “Gator stomp.”
The result of the play was seven points for UGA and an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. The ‘Dawgs went on to win the game 42-30.
Richt, who coached UGA from 2001-2015, was asked about the 10-year anniversary of the play this week, according to a report from AL.com.
Here is what Richt had to say, as cited from the report linked above:
“Well, what led to it is we got beat really bad by Tennessee, and then the next game we played was Vanderbilt, and we barely won it,” Richt explained. “There was not a lot of enthusiasm, and I was like, ‘We’ve got to create some energy somehow.’ And so when I was at coordinator at Florida State, I used to — every so often, say, hey, ‘when we score, you guys celebrate hard enough — just celebrate hard, and if you don’t celebrate hard enough to get a flag, then you didn’t celebrate hard enough.’
“So whether it’s right or wrong, that was the thinking behind it. And that’s what I told our team, and what I thought they heard was the team that’s on the field, you celebrate, because what happened during the week is we had an open date actually, and so every time they’d score against the scout team, some guy would like try to spike it through the goal post or spin the ball.
“I’m like, ‘You guys don’t get it, this is a team celebration, not an individual celebration.’ I think when I said the whole team needs to celebrate, or when I said the team needs to celebrate, they thought the whole team, and I was really talking about whoever was in the game at the time. So when he scored, they really felt like they had an obligation to go celebrate, and they got at least two penalties. But the goal really was not for the team to come off the bench. The goal was for the guys on the field to just celebrate real hard, and as it turned out, everybody ran out there except for Dannell Ellerbe, and I think he was in the doghouse and he knew not to go out.”
Richt certainly was able to give his team an energy boost in that game, as Bulldogs fans happily remember.
Georgia kicks off against Florida in the World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party on Saturday at 3:30 p.m. ET on CBS.
The 10-year anniversary couldn’t come at a better time for the ‘Dawgs. UGA is undefeated at 7-0, in firm control of the SEC’s Eastern Division and ranked No. 3 in the country.
Cody McClure is an SEC Football Writer for Saturday Down South. He lives in Knoxville, Tennessee, where he also co-hosts a midday sports radio show for FOX Sports. Cody previously worked for Athlon Sports.
