Georgia football formally announced the hiring of Stacy Searels as the offensive line coach on Monday. Searels will replace Matt Luke who stepped down last week in order to spend more time with his family.
Searels has prior coaching experience at Georgia, as he coached the offensive line from 2007 to 2010 when Mark Richt was the head coach. Prior to taking the Georgia job, Searles was the offensive line coach at North Carolina for the past three seasons. He also has stops at Miami, Virginia Tech, Texas and LSU.
While working at LSU, Searels worked with Smart and Georgia’s co-defensive coordinator Will Muschamp as all three were on the 2004 LSU staff.
Searels is the fourth on-field assistant coaching hire Georgia has had to make this offseason. Bryan McClendon replaced Cortez Hankton as the wide receivers coach, Chidrea Uzo-Diribe is the new outside linebackers coach as he takes over for Dan Lanning and Fran Brown is the new defensive backs coach after Jahmile Addae left for the same position at Miami.
Georgia has also hired Mike Bobo and Kirk Benedict as analysts this offseason. Muschamp received a title bump as he will be the co-defensive coordinator for the Bulldogs, sharing the title with inside linebackers coach Glenn Schumann.
Of the three offensive assistants Georgia brought in this offseason, Bobo, McClendon and Searels all have previous coaching experience at Georgia.
Related: Mark Richt shares why he hired offensive line coach Stacy Searels twice, at Georgia and Miami
As for the on-field talent for Georgia’s offensive line in 2022, the Bulldogs do have to replace multi-year starters in Jamaree Salyer and Justin Shaffer. Georgia does return starters Warren McClendon, Sedrick Van Pran-Granger and Warren Ericson. There are also a number of promising young players who will look to push for playing time in Broderick Jones, Amarius Mims and Tate Ratledge.
Georgia did rank sixth in the country last year in sacks allowed per game while ranking 14th in yards per carry. Running backs Zamir White and James Cook are both off to the NFL but Kenny McIntosh and Kendall Milton return next season.
The Bulldogs will begin working with Searels shortly, as Georgia begins spring practice on March 15. The Bulldogs will have 15 spring practices, culminating with the annual G-Day scrimmage on April 16 in Sanford Stadium. Georgia is the defending National Champion and opens the 2022 season on Sept. 3 against Oregon.
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