This year’s Georgia-Alabama game is going to look different. For one, it will be played during the regular season, as the two teams have mostly met in the SEC championship game.

But the Sept. 28 game will be different in some ways because Nick Saban is no longer on the Alabama sideline. The legendary head coach retired in January and was replaced by Kalen DeBoer.

“I get it. I totally get it. I understand there’s only one Coach Saban,” DeBoer said at SEC media days. “There will only ever be one Coach Saban. This program is special, and I guess I just take it as a great honor to be the one that gets to do everything we can to carry on the great tradition.

“I’ve heard it from our guys. I know Coach Saban just poured into these guys. He loved them. He believed in them. He pushed them to be their best.”

But neither DeBoer nor his Georgia counterpart Kirby Smart, expect the game to be any less intense when the two teams face off in primetime on Sept. 28.

Both schools care deeply about being great at football. Smart knows that, having worked at both Alabama under Saban and now running the Georgia program for what will be his ninth season.

“You’re talking about two teams that have been at the forefront of college football, and it’s probably going to be that way for a long time,” Smart said. “Both great universities, both committed. The commitment to excellence at both places is really high. The standard that coach created there at Alabama and the standard we’ve created, those two are going to be matching up for a long time, and I think that’s what is great about college athletics.”

Smart hopes to have more success against Alabama now that Saban has moved into a role as an ESPN broadcaster. Smart went 1-5 against Saban, with the lone win coming in the 2022 National Championship Game. Alabama bested Georgia 27-24 last season in the SEC championship game.

The Bulldogs spent time in Dallas downplaying the significance of the Alabama contest, given it was Georgia’s only loss of the 2023 season. The defeat ended a 29-game winning streak for Georgia.

As for DeBoer, he spent plenty of time talking about Saban at media days. He made sure to be respectful of all Saban built and accomplished while attempting to put his own spin on the storied Alabama program.

“I think you always look at -- I mean, every coach is different,” DeBoer said. “We all have different personalities. We all have our styles, especially when you’ve been doing it for a while in this profession you kind of have the things that you really like to do and favor.”

Georgia and Alabama have won the last four SEC championships and all but one dating back to the 2016 season, Smart’s first in Athens. It will be a new look SEC in 2024, with Texas and Oklahoma joining the league and with Saban, who won nine SEC championships in his time at Alabama, no longer around.

But Georgia and Alabama both still expect to be at the top of the league. And the game on Sept. 28 will go a long way in determining that.