I know it's all about repeating, but can we appreciate what Georgia just pulled off?
ATLANTA — Stetson Bennett IV watched his pass fall into the oversized hands of 6-7 Darnell Washington in the back of the end zone. The 25-year-old quarterback looked over at his Georgia sideline and shook his head as he met his team for the end zone celebration. Bennett’s look said what everyone else in the college football world was thinking.
“Man, this isn’t fair.”
(Bennett actually said afterwards he was thinking that “it’s fun to throw to somebody that big and that fast. Thank you for bringing him here and thank you for calling that play.”)
It’s not fair that Georgia lost more talent to the NFL Draft than any team ever had, and it just did this. By “this,” I mean, it just trucked LSU in the SEC Championship to clinch a 13-0 start and a No. 1 overall seed in the Playoff.
Well, unofficially, UGA is the 1-seed. But who are we kidding? There’s no doubt who the best team in America has been to this point.
It’s Georgia, AKA the defense who had 8 players drafted from arguably the best 21st century unit and came back with the nation’s top scoring defense entering conference championship weekend.
It’s Georgia, AKA the offense who lost its top 2 running backs and top 2 receivers and came back by posting a top-10 offense with a 50-point showing against a respected LSU defense.
It’s Georgia, AKA the team who won its first national title in 41 years and came back by clubbing 4 teams currently ranked in the top 25 of the Playoff rankings en route to its first 13-0 start in school history.
Did I say 4? I meant 5 if we’re including LSU, which we should.
Say what you want about the SEC West. It was a down year to have a 3-loss team in Atlanta for the first time in nearly 2 decades. And no, it wasn’t Alabama standing in the way of SEC glory.
Still, Georgia just became the second East squad to win an SEC title since 2009. Prior to Saturday, Kirby Smart had more national championship appearances than SEC titles. That’s because last year’s squad didn’t get that done with a blowout loss to Alabama.
Was that on the minds of Georgia? You bet.
“We want to be different than last year’s team,” UGA tight end Brock Bowers said. “Winning this one’s a way to be different.”
“Winning the SEC Championship, there’s only one of those. It’s a banner,” Bennett said. “It’s the same thing as a national championship, just a little smaller scale. So yeah, it was important to us.”
Smart talked about how he wants to start the new trend of making sure no senior leaves his program without at least 1 SEC Championship, and with 2017 being Georgia’s last league title, that was in jeopardy.
It certainly wasn’t by day’s end.
The only real second half moment when things got interesting was in the middle of the 3rd quarter when backup quarterback Garrett Nussmeier marched LSU into the red zone and the Tigers were threatening to make it a 2-score game. But Jalen Carter and the Georgia front stuffed a 4th-and-1 attempt … and then the Dawgs marched 95 yards to put the game away for good.
That’s all UGA does. Or rather, it’s all this version of UGA does.
Hand Smart’s squad a perceived setback, and it gets turned into fuel. Since Georgia lost that game against Alabama last year, it won 15 consecutive games, 5 of which were against AP Top 25 teams (at the time of the matchup). All of the matchups against ranked foes were decided by at least 14 points.
It’s not supposed to be like this. Not when you lose the contributors Georgia did. UGA became the 5th team in the Playoff era to follow a national championship season with a 13-0 start, but as you can see, nobody dealt with the production loss of 2022 Georgia.
By the way, that doesn’t include losing senior captain Nolan Smith to a season-ending injury in October. With all due respect to Smith, who could very well be a first-round pick in April’s NFL Draft, it’s easy to forget that. You still see some familiar faces on that Georgia defense like Carter, who recorded a sack while picking up Jayden Daniels in one hand and fittingly holding up a No. 1 in the other.
Jalen Carter is a BAD MAN ? pic.twitter.com/ENFeSG8hAu
— NFL Rookie Watch (@NFLRookieWatxh) December 3, 2022
You still see a guy like Christopher Smith, who burst onto the scene in the 2021 season opener against Clemson when his pick-6 of DJ Uiagalelei was the difference. On Saturday, Smith actually jumped the same exact route, only this time instead of a pick-6, he tipped the ball in the air and had it bounce off the helmet of LSU receiver Jack Bech and into the arms of UGA linebacker Smael Mondon.
Can’t make this one up.
INTERCEPTION OFF THE HELMET! pic.twitter.com/diJ19WtzZ0— CBS Sports (@CBSSports) December 3, 2022
One can look at that play and say “oh, Georgia gets all the breaks.” But when you hear Smart explain a sequence like that afterwards, you realize that was anything but lucky.
Smart: “I think it’s more about his instincts. That’s the same play and same exact route that he picked off on Clemson last year. He jumped it. He played it aggressive. He understood what the quarterback’s check was. He understood his leverage. How many times do you think you’ve run that stunt since you’ve been here?”
Smith: “A ton.”
Smart: “A ton. He saw it, jumped it. By him jumping, it caused the ball to go in the air. And then it bounced off him. We talk about tips and overthrows, (former UGA defensive coordinator) Mel Tucker had a saying here, what do we say, Chris, tips and overthrows?”
Smith: “Got to get those.”
Smart: “We got ’em. That’s a big deal.”
Don’t take that kind of prep for granted on any team, much less one who entered 2022 ranked No. 122 in FBS in percentage of returning defensive production. Van Pran talked about finding fun in the little things like meeting with teammates to watch film and how those moments are how UGA bonds away from the field.
“Everybody’s a faceless player,” Sedrick Van Pran said. “Everybody is going in there and playing for that ‘G.’ Ultimately, it’s showing that we are the standard of the University of Georgia. We want to uphold that no matter who’s in.”
It’s one thing to say things like that. It’s another to see it in action. Or you see when Bennett is asked about Smart potentially campaigning for his Heisman Trophy chances after a 4-touchdown day to clinch a 13-0 start, he rolls his eyes as if to say “that’s not what I’m here to do.”
It’s true. What Bennett and Georgia are here to do is simpler than ever with the SEC Championship finally coming back to Athens — win a national title. Again.
Becoming the 4th team to repeat as national champs since 1980 takes a certain level of discipline. So far, this Georgia team passed that test with flying colors. Bowers talked about watching other elite teams lose and understanding that anything can happen on any given day. Shoot, Georgia was that team last year when it came into Atlanta as a significant favorite against Alabama.
In a way, Saturday felt like UGA avenged that loss. Georgia didn’t have to manufacture any motivation for the beatdown we saw play out on Saturday. At this point, it’s only competing against itself.
“We said in there. ‘Does losing really spark these next 30 days or can we do it again with winning all of them?’” Bowers said. “We’ve just gotta find a new gear.”
Another new gear for Georgia? That’s not fair.