What did we really see Saturday, as the Dawgs shut out one of the hottest teams in college football by a 37-0 score?
While Sam Pittman’s Arkansas Razorbacks came into the game at No. 8, riding big wins over Texas and Texas A&M, and with a highly ranked offense and defense, you’ll no doubt see some nattering nabobs say the Hogs were overrated, and didn’t really deserve a Top 10 ranking, just like Clemson didn’t truly deserve its Top 5 ranking when the Dawgs beat them.
Kirby Smart would beg to differ. “This is a good football team we beat,” he told ESPN after Saturday’s game.
Those who still can’t bring themselves to buy No. 2-ranked Georgia as a truly elite team once more will trot out the oft heard line that Smart himself has adapted in practice to keep his players humble: Georgia still “ain’t played nobody,” so we don’t really know how good they are.
(That’s in contrast, of course, to Florida, which lost its only Top 10 matchup so far, but walked away with praise aplenty. Of course, now that the Gators have been beaten by Kentucky, will their previous Top 10 ranking be considered an aberration?)
I digress. Here’s the bottom line:
The Georgia Bulldogs shut out the No. 8 team in the country, while playing at noon and having to start their backup quarterback. And, in a win that never was in doubt, the Dawgs prevailed by UGA’s largest-ever margin of victory against a Top 10 team, topping a 34-0 win over Georgia Tech back in 1942.
Let that sink in.
To my mind, those who don’t find this game impressive don’t really have a grasp of the intricacies of college football.
On the other hand, there are those who do understand what Smart’s Dawgs have accomplished so far in racking up their 5-0 record, including wins over two highly ranked teams. One of them is ESPN’s Jesse Palmer, who said this after Saturday’s game: “Georgia is a national championship caliber team.”
Smart prefers to focus on a goal of being an “elite” program. And, on Saturday in Athens, that certainly was the case — from the lock-down defense to the versatile offense (which showed it really does have a running game) to the special teams (which scored a TD) and the capacity crowd, which showed up early and loud, just as the Georgia coach had urged, making it difficult for the Hogs to get off plays without jumping offsides.
Citing all those factors, especially the fans, Smart told the Bulldogs radio network’s DJ Shockley after the game that it was “a total team chemistry UGA win.”
It might not have been a very competitive game in the end, but there’s a lot to unpack from Georgia’s latest win, starting with the latest chapter in the Stetson Bennett saga.
The former walk-on quarterback, who lost the starting job to transfer JT Daniels last season, stepped in to take Daniels’ place for the second time this season, after the Georgia starter strained his latissimus dorsi, or “lat,” the muscle running across his back and side, which made Daniels wince during his brief warm-up throws Saturday.
Bennett, many people say, is fine as a backup, but he’s not the sort of QB who can lead you to a national championship. Maybe not, though Georgia came within one double overtime play of winning a national title four seasons ago with a quarterback who started out as the backup.
Still, while Smart noted before the game that “we gotta get JT healthy,” Bennett was good enough Saturday to knock off a Top 10 opponent.
Yes, quarterback is a key position, and Daniels is an extremely talented passer (albeit, not the most mobile or sturdy of players). Still, Georgia has the nation’s best defense and lots of offensive talent surrounding whoever takes the snap. Whether it’s Daniels or Bennett quarterbacking key games this season, the Dawgs should be competitive.
Speaking of the offense, in answer to a tough Arkansas defense with a six-man secondary designed to shut down the pass and only three men on the line, Georgia proved something that had been in question in its first four games: It indeed can run the ball down an opponent’s throat.
In fact, the Dawgs ran the ball on 22 of their first 26 plays as they got off to another blistering fast start — leading 21-0 at the end of the first quarter. (Arkansas previously had not allowed any points in the first quarter this season.)
The offense was much more conservative after Georgia got that big lead, and you have to wonder whether Smart was doing his best not to run the score up on his old friend and assistant, Pittman.
Bennett didn’t throw much, though he did complete 7 of 11 passes (with one drop) for 72 yards. Mostly, the Dawgs stuck to the rushing attack, finishing with 345 yards of total offense, including 273 on the ground, running the ball a season-high 57 times. That was the most rushing attempts in the Smart era.
James Cook led Dawgs runners with 87 yards on 12 carries. Zamir White had a team-high 16 carries for 68 yards and two TDs (plus another score on special teams). Kenny McIntosh ran 10 times for 57 yards and Kendall Milton carried the ball 12 times for 48 yards and a TD.
White ran especially tough, bulling his way through defenders on one 8-yard gain, and scoring on an amazing play where he showed incredible effort in managing to keep his balance (testing his surgically repaired knees to the max). Also, the OL’s run-blocking mostly was excellent. At one point, when the backups were in, they pushed the pile for a first down in what looked like a rugby scrum.
As Bennett explained after the game, “We knew going in, if they were going to try to play three down linemen, if they were going to try to play dime personnel with six defensive backs on the field, we knew they … were basically challenging us, can we run the ball? They were saying we couldn’t, and we said we could today.”
Sounding like an alum already, he added: “It reminded me of old times when Georgia used to run the ball a lot. It was good. As a quarterback, when you’ve got a great defense and a great run game, it’s pretty easy. … When you can run the ball, you can control the game. When you have good defense, you can control the game.”
Ah, yes, the defense. Georgia fans should savor this amazing assemblage of talent while they can, because it absolutely is stifling opponents. Giant defensive lineman Jordan Davis continued to prove that 360-pound men can move with remarkable speed and agility. And, Georgia’s D shut down yet another dual-threat QB (the Razorbacks’ KJ Jefferson was 8 of 15 for 65 yards passing Saturday, ran 8 times for a net 5 yards and was sacked 4 times), and smothered another highly touted pass receiver (Treylon Burks had 3 catches for 10 yards).
The Dawgs notched their first back-to-back shutouts in SEC play since the magical season of 1980 and their first shutout of a Top 10 team since beating Bama 21-0 in 1976.
The key, Smart said, was disrupting the Arkansas QB’s play: “We wanted him to be uncomfortable.”
Of course, the Hogs didn’t help themselves, drawing numerous penalty flags (including three different ones on one play!), which made it difficult for them to get any momentum going.
Arkansas, which had been averaging 35.8 points per game, and was among the top teams nationally in rushing yards and yards per play, was held to no points and just 162 total yards, 60 of which came on its final drive, when it was running out the clock.
Georgia leads the nation in scoring defense, allowing just 4.6 points per game. The Dawgs’ opponents have scored just 23 points this season.
However, playing D isn’t enough for some of these guys. On a first-quarter play down near the Arkansas goal line, a couple of defensive linemen, Jalen Carter and Davis, were brought in as blockers. Following behind Carter, who cleared a trio of Razorback defenders like a bulldozer grading a road, tailback Milton got his first TD as a Dawg.
Special teams play also was mostly quite special Saturday, with the odd exception of flags for lining up in an illegal formation on three consecutive punts. Placekicker Jack Podlesny made all three of his field goal attempts and, on a spectacular play, walk-on Dan Jackson blocked a Hogs punt in the Arkansas end zone, allowing White to cover it for a score.
So, to sum up: the Sanford Stadium crowd was “elite,” as Smart said, the defense were lords of chaos, Bennett was solid, and the run game was awesome.
Sure, there’s still room for improvement, as always. Bennett’s one real weakness is a tendency to try to force a pass into coverage, and he did so again on a third-and-5 play Saturday that should have resulted in an interception, but the Hog defender couldn’t hold on to the ball. There also was some loss of focus by the Georgia offense in the second quarter (repeating last week’s tendency after getting out to a big lead) and some sloppy tackling on the Hogs’ one decent drive, which ended in a missed field goal attempt.
A couple of off-field notes: Despite the noon kickoff, the Georgia-Arkansas game drew ESPN’s A-team of announcers (Chris Fowler, Kirk Herbstreit and Holly Rowe), which was a refreshing change. Also adding to the special nature of Saturday’s game was the presence in Athens of ESPN’s “GameDay” pre-game show, which did two hours in front of a mob of Georgia fans in Myers Quad and then the final hour inside Sanford Stadium, on the West End plaza.
In a case of perfect timing, “GameDay” wound up its telecast (with all the panelists picking UGA to win) with the Redcoat Band’s pre-game performance of the Battle Hymn of the Bulldog Nation in the background. And, then, at the end of the game, as the crew was signing off, the Redcoats bookended the day with yet another performance of the song, winding up with the “Go Dawgs!” ending.
That was pretty sweet, but so was Rowe’s story of how mascot Uga X came ambling out of his air-conditioned Dawg House at halftime and proceeded to start sniffing around the College Football Playoff national championship trophy, which was on display Between the Hedges.
I love that.
