Early thoughts on yet another Alabama-Georgia showdown in the 2025 SEC Championship
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Lost in the shuffle of perhaps the wildest weekend in the history of the SEC coaching carousel was the fact that we got the thing everyone is playing for — 2 SEC Championship berths.
For the 4th time in the last 9 seasons, Alabama and Georgia will face off for a conference title. For the 8th time in the Kirby Smart era, he’ll lead UGA in an SEC Championship, and for the 9th time in the Smart era, he’ll face the Alabama program that he left.
Smart is, in case you haven’t heard, 1-7 in those matchups having lost his first 2 to Kalen DeBoer, including a 24-21 thriller earlier in the season in Athens. Something tells me that’ll come up once or twice this week.
But that’s not the only thing that matters for the SEC Championship. Here are some early thoughts on what’s at stake in Atlanta:
Yes, I believe Alabama will get a Round 1 bye with a win
Why? There’s more than a decade of precedent from the selection committee of giving the SEC Championship winner a top-4 seed:
- 2014 Alabama, 1 seed
- 2015 Alabama, 2 seed
- 2016 Alabama, 1 seed
- 2017 Georgia, 3 seed
- 2018 Alabama, 1 seed
- 2019 LSU, 1 seed
- 2020 Alabama, 1 seed
- 2021 Alabama, 1 seed
- 2022 Georgia, 1 seed
- 2023 Alabama, 4 seed
- 2024 Georgia, 2 seed (got auto-bye as 1 of 4 highest-ranked conference champs)
Yes, it’s a new year with a different field at the top. But there’s no chance that Alabama is going to stay behind Georgia if it wins that matchup for a second time. The debate wouldn’t be about Alabama being worthy of a top-4 seed; it would be if Alabama’s résumé, which would include 5 wins over AP Top 25 foes, would be enough to jump potential Big 12 champ Texas Tech and the Big Ten Championship loser.
That’s where it could depend on how those games feel. Does Alabama drop the hammer on Georgia? Is the Big Ten Championship a lopsided affair? Does Texas Tech control the tempo against BYU again? But again, that’s just for how seeding would look among those Round 1 byes.
It’s wild to think that Alabama entered the regular-season finale with so much variance. Who knew the 12-team Playoff could produce such a thing?
Georgia falling out of the Round 1 bye with a loss would make more sense than Alabama falling out of the CFP with a loss … unless BYU pulls off a stunner
Speaking of SEC Championship precedent, Georgia losing the SEC Championship would be like what Texas experienced last year at the hands of the Dawgs. That is, enter conference championship weekend as a 1-loss team, but lose for the second time to a 2-loss team who would have a seeding advantage. Worst-case scenario, Georgia is going to have a home Playoff game in which it figures to be a significant favorite.
Alabama, on the other hand, has a different type of precedent that’s working in its favor. Last year, SMU wasn’t punished for earning an ACC Championship berth and falling behind idle teams with that loss to Clemson. That’s good news for the Tide to fend off teams like Miami (FL), Utah and Vandy, who it beat in Tuscaloosa.
Where things get much less certain is if BYU knocks off Texas Tech in the Big 12 Championship. BYU isn’t getting left out of the field, so if Alabama is considered the last team in at No. 10 in the pre-conference title Playoff Poll, it would be in jeopardy of falling out. At the same time, let’s pretend for this argument that Alabama was idle heading into this weekend and BYU beat Texas Tech. The Tide would still get jumped by BYU.
That’s why that Notre Dame ranking a couple weeks ago was so significant. The Irish will be idle, and in the unlikely event that Alabama could jump Marcus Freeman’s squad just by beating Auburn, that doesn’t figure to change heading into conference championship weekend. Alabama losing but jumping Notre Dame to stay in the field wouldn’t make sense, which is why Alabama isn’t necessarily a lock to make the field yet.
The good news, though, is that BYU is nearly a 2-touchdown underdog (via FanDuel) against a Texas Tech team who dominated the first matchup. In addition to making their first ever Big 12 Championship appearance, the Red Raiders are playing for a Round 1 bye. In other words, there’s still a ton of incentive for Texas Tech to show up and make sure that BYU doesn’t crash Alabama’s Playoff party.
Georgia’s biggest issue in that first matchup was getting off the field on 3rd down … has that been fixed?
The first time these teams met, Ty Simpson was surgical on 3rd down. Alabama converted a whopping 13-for-19 3rd-down attempts, which proved to be the difference in a 3-point game in which the Tide didn’t score a point in the second half. Georgia’s lack of a pass rush proved costly and Simpson played like someone who was in complete control.
Has Georgia fixed that? In the games that Georgia played in November, here’s what those opposing 3rd-down conversion rates were:
- Florida: 2-for-11
- Mississippi State: 8-for-16
- Texas: 2-for-12
- Charlotte: 1-for-11
- Georgia Tech: 4-for-11
- Total: 17-for-61 (27.9%)
Georgia was No. 13 in FBS in opposing 3rd-down conversion rate in November. Alabama, meanwhile, regressed in that department in November with a 38.9% 3rd-down conversion rate the last month, including a 4-for-17 mark against the blitz-heavy Auburn defense. That’s down from 45.6% in October and 54.6% in August/September.
It’s worth noting that Alabama converted 70% of its 4th-down attempts in November, which was the 7th-best rate among FBS teams with 10 such attempts. That included a 3-for-3 mark against Auburn, who couldn’t get a stop on the game-winning touchdown to ultimately clinch Alabama’s spot in Atlanta.
But it does feel like that script has at least flipped a bit since these teams met in September. Georgia has been much better at consistently dialing up pressure. The return of captain/sacks leader CJ Allen for the Georgia Tech game was crucial, even if he wasn’t making big-time plays like he has been all season. Raylen Wilson and Christen Miller have been Georgia’s most consistent pass rushers with a combined 14 hurries in the last 3 Power Conference games.
The blueprint on containing Simpson has been dialing up unique pressure packages. Doing that and forcing the Tide to mass-protect — potentially with a freshman running back — could be the name of the game for Smart and Glenn Schumann.
The mid-game injuries to Jam Miller and Drew Bobo on Saturday felt like they changed their respective offenses
I’ve been critical of Miller this year, but in the first half against Auburn, he looked like the guy we saw against Mizzou. But unfortunately, like the Mizzou game, Miller left with an injury. He left Saturday night’s game on crutches in a boot, and after his departure, the Alabama ground attack faded.
That’s the case on the Georgia side with Bobo, who also spent the second half of the regular-season finale in a boot and watched the UGA ground attack fade. It’s unknown what Bobo’s availability will be on Saturday, but it was clear that his dad’s offense was stuck in neutral without him. Perhaps there was some game managing going on there. UGA could play the long game with the valuable center and not take any chances in the SEC Championship.
If both players are out, that would change offensive game plans significantly. Alabama has had to adapt to Miller’s absence more than UGA with Bobo, but it’s hard to stomach that type of a loss after seeing what the veteran back looked like on Saturday night when he had a season-high 63 yards after first contact. Miller also got 19 scrimmage touches in the first Georgia matchup when he returned to the lineup after missing the first 3 games. With or without Miller, it’ll be an all-hands-on-deck effort against UGA’s No. 6 run defense in FBS.
In other words, it’s fair to have some skepticism about how both ground attacks will look on Saturday.
Remember Ryan Williams?
Like, the guy who was the youngest college football video game cover athlete ever? Like, the guy who did this to Georgia?
Yeah, that guy. He didn’t have a single target against Auburn. His most noteworthy play might’ve been when he ran a pick play that freed up the aforementioned Miller on a wheel route, but the effort was for naught because the Alabama back wasn’t ready for the pass.
Williams is the guy who burst onto the national scene against Georgia last year. Since that game, he hit 100 yards once. Since Week 7, he has just 19 catches for 262 yards and a touchdown. That’s a 7-game sample size in which Williams has been quiet. DeBoer said after the Auburn game that his lack of involvement wasn’t intentional, but that they needed to do a better job of finding ways to get a player of his caliber more touches after he has just 7 in Alabama’s last 4 contests.
To be fair, it’s not that Alabama has forgotten about him. He’s had nearly a 50-50 split of wide snaps vs. slot snaps, and after struggling with drops early in the season, he’s only had 2 drops in that 7-game stretch, which included an 11-target game against South Carolina.
But it is bizarre to think a player so decorated had just 378 receiving yards in 8 conference games (No. 22 in SEC). He’s 3rd on Alabama in both 3rd-down catches (9) and contested catch targets (7) this season. That can’t be pinned entirely on the emergence of Lotzeir Brooks out of the slot, but that and a lack of yards after catch (244 YAC yards this year compared to 397 last year) have played a part in what’s been a quiet year for Williams.
Saturday would be as good a time as any to re-introduce himself to Georgia and the college football world.
A couple of Kalen DeBoer stats to chew on
You already know about the 2-0 mark vs. Smart. Let’s get a little creative.
In 4 years as a Power Conference head coach, DeBoer is 9-2 vs. AP Top 25 teams in games played in November or later. That .818 winning percentage lines up with his .850 winning percentage in all games played vs. ranked foes since he became a Power Conference coach in 2022. In that stretch, DeBoer is 7-1 vs. AP Top 10 teams win the lone loss being in the 2023 College Football Playoff National Championship vs. Michigan. Among coaches with 4 such games, DeBoer’s .875 winning percentage is easily the best among active coaches.
Who’s No. 2 on that list? Smart, with at .769 (10-3). Both Smart and DeBoer are tied with Ryan Day for the most wins away from home vs. AP Top 10 teams (5) since the start of 2022.
Say what you want about DeBoer handling all the ebbs and flows of being Nick Saban’s successor at Alabama. What cannot be denied is his track record in big-time matchups.
Saturday would certainly qualify as that.
Connor O'Gara is the senior national columnist for Saturday Down South. He's a member of the Football Writers Association of America. After spending his entire life living in B1G country, he moved to the South in 2015.
