Georgia survived its first SEC road trip of the season, pulling out a 13-12 victory over Kentucky in Lexington,

“We’re resilient,” said Kirby Smart, whose program extended its winning streak against the Wildcats to 15 games. “Two years ago we go to Missouri and we almost lose that game at night, on the road, played at Auburn last year, on the road, almost lost that game.

“You’ve got to find ways to win these, and that’s what we did, we found a way to win.”

The No. 1-ranked Bulldogs (3-0) won their SEC-record 28th-straight conference game while running their modern-era record regular-season win streak to 42 games.

Georgia entered the fourth quarter at Kentucky trailing 9-6 before Branson Robinson’s 3-yard TD run capped a 10-play, 68-yard drive that gave the Bulldogs their first lead of the night, a 13-9 advantage with 12:20 left.

Kentucky answered when former UGA quarterback Brock Vandagriff (14 of 27, 114 yards) engineered an 11-play, 43-yard drive that resulted in a 51-yard field goal that pulled the Wildcats back to within 13-12 with 8:01 remaining.

After the teams exchanged possessions, Carson Beck (15 of 24, 160 yards) and the offense, which had struggled much of the night, took over with 2:58 left at their own 15 and proceeded to pick up two first downs and run all but 10 second off the clock.

“It wasn’t about Carson Beck tonight, it was about a lot of other things, it was a little bit about Kentucky playing really physical and doing a good job, they came after us, and were really aggressive, we have to have answers for that,” Smart said during the ABC-TV on-field interview.

“But you know what, in the end our offense did pretty good when they had to, they got first downs and they ate a lot of clock, I was really proud of them for that.”

Kentucky took over at their own 20 with no timeouts left and, after a 12-yard completion with three seconds left, was unable to execute a hook-and-ladder play as time expired.

“A lot of confidence in our defense,” said Smart, whose team has yet to give up a touchdown through three games. “Our defense played lights out tonight.”

Smart indicated the close call against the Wildcats - a 24-point underdog -- should get his team’s attention as it heads into the bye week and builds toward a Sept. 28 showdown at Alabama.

“When you play on the road in the SEC, people don’t respect that, and I’m not sure our guys listened to the message this week, because this is a good football team,” Smart said of a UK team that lost 31-6 to South Carolina at home last Saturday.

“You don’t judge SEC teams on one week …. we did what we had to do, but we did not play real well tonight,” he said. “The best news is, we can coach these guys up and get better, because the number one thing we’ve got to do is get better.”

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