Given all of Georgia’s success last season, both on and off the field, the key to the offseason for Kirby Smart appears to be ensuring his team still keeps an edge to them.

During his introductory spring press conference, the Georgia coach touched on what made the team’s season such a success in his second season back in Athens and the importance of maintaining that edge despite losing so many senior leaders this offseason.

“There wasn’t a whole lot of difference in the people on the roster (in 2016 and 2017), but the outcomes were completely different,” Smart said. “Why was that? Did we have an influx of talent all of a sudden in 2017 or did we have a different demeanor? Did we have a different attitude? Did we have a chip on our shoulder? So what is going to be your motivating factor? And I think each team is very different.

“My concern for this team is not understanding that they’re going to be the target for everyone they play. We’re not going to sit back and let people hunt us. We’re going to continue to hunt. We’re an aggressive team. That’s what we want to be. We’re trying to grow as a team and get better. I think they’ll embrace that challenge. We’ve got some good leaders on this team. They’ve just got to learn to step up and be vocal.”

Given Georgia’s status as the reigning SEC Champion, Smart has a point. Every week, opponents will be gunning for the league champion with every divisional opponent likely understanding that the difference between winning and losing the division title could come down to beating the Dawgs.

So how does Smart plan to combat complacency? By raising the expectations of his program to new heights this offseason.

“We want to create a brand that we are expecting to go out and dominate our opponent. That’s what we thrive to do. That’s why we go lift weights. That’s why we go and run. We want to dominate every opponent. That’s our goal. Go out and dominate our opponent,” Smart continued. “It’s not about what you guys (the media) think, what the fans think. It’s not about any of that. It’s about what we can do to make sure our players are playing at the highest level every week, week in and week out. That’s our ultimate goal.”

Added a final note to this train of thought, Smart vows to keep his foot on the accelerator and never play fearing to lose. Something he claims to witness far too often from others.

“When you play aggressive, you watch all those basketball tournaments, I watch all these basketball tournaments over and over and over. The more aggressive team wins. The team that’s playing aggressive. I’m not going out here not to lose. I’m going out there to play aggressive,” he said. “So we’ll continue to do that in how we practice, because the offense is going to go against the defense. The left guard’s going to go against the right guard. The left receiver’s going to go against the right cornerback, and we’re going to be aggressive. We’re not going to go out there and sit back and say what is somebody else doing? We’re worried about us.”