Kirby Smart says no added motivation to beat Nick Saban in SEC Championship
By Mark Kern
Published:
Kirby Smart will look to do something in this year’s SEC Championship Game he hasn’t yet done.
Of all the great things that Smart has accomplished during his time at Georgia, he hasn’t been able to beat Alabama in an SEC title fight.
Georgia has met Alabama twice in the SEC championship since Smart took over the program. The Crimson Tide have won both of them. Despite that, Smart said there is no added motivation to win next Saturday.
“Not really,” Smart said on Sunday’s teleconference call. “The motivation for me is for our players to get better throughout the year. I don’t look at it as who we play. I look at it as we don’t control who goes into that game we play.
“We had a chance to beat LSU and didn’t. Then we had a chance to beat LSU and we did. We had a chance to beat Auburn and we did. We had a chance to beat Alabama and we haven’t,” Smart said.
The Bulldogs capped off an undefeated regular season with a 31-23 win at in-state rival Georgia Tech on Saturday night.
With the win, all that is separating the Bulldogs from being in the College Football Playoff and trying to win their 3rd straight national championship game is the SEC championship game against Nick Saban and Alabama.
The last time Georgia lost a game was to Alabama in the 2021 SEC Championship, but they bounced back and knocked off the Crimson Tide in the national championship that year.
“It’s not an extra motivating factor for me,” Smart continued. “I’m not looking for checkmarks or checking boxes or certain tick marks to try to get on your belt. That’s not what I got in this for.
“For me, it’s for giving our kids a chance to do something special and represent this university. That’s what we want to go do, we want to go play our best.”
