ATHENS —Kirby Smart knows what to do with extra preparation time, to the extent his Georgia football teams have won a staggering 21 in a row with more than a week to prepare.
That would seem to be good news with the No. 1-ranked Bulldogs using this bye week to prepare for a critical showdown at No. 4 Alabama at 7:30 p.m. on Sept. 28.
“Better never rests, we’re trying to get better all the time,” Smart said, sharing his overall philosophy on what extra preparation time means in his two-time national championship program.
“It’s all about detailing that improvement and how are you going to attack it?”
Smart’s general approach aside, there are provisions made for each specific circumstance.
“Are you going to do the same thing you’ve done every year? Well, you may not have the same team,” Smart explained this week. “You may not have the same special teams. You may have different needs one year to the next.
“That’s not all based on Kentucky. That’s based on Tennessee Tech. That’s based on Clemson. That’s based on injuries. It’s based on improvement. And we change the schedules each bye week to fit, to suit what we need.”
As things stand
Georgia’s most glaring early-season need is along a banged-up defensive line. Injuries caused starters Mykel Williams and Warren Brinson to miss the Kentucky game — and UGA to sink to 46th in the nation against the run.
UK game defensive line starters Tyrion Ingram-Dawkins (63 snaps), Christen Miller (58) and Nazir Stackhouse (52) took an inordinately high number of snaps.
“It’s not normal for us,” Smart admitted. “We’d like to rotate at that position, we want to stay fresh.”
Smart shared optimism this week that Brinson and Williams — who can play tackle or end — will be ready for Alabama, while youthful depth is developing quickly.
“We’re in a lot better place —we’ve got young defensive linemen that are getting better,” Smart said. “I do think Jamaal Jarrett (5 snaps) and Xzavier McCleod (15) did a good job of relieving those guys some, and probably could have done even more, but neither of them had gotten a lot of work ….
“It’s one of those things that feel much better in this off-week already with the guys that are taking reps.”
Inside the numbers
Smart has won 10 straight in-season games coming off a bye week since suffering his only loss after a bye week, back in his first season as UGA’s head coach (2016, a 24-10 setback to Florida).
Georgia has also won 16 straight in opponents’ stadiums, dating back to a loss at Alabama in 2020, losing to the eventual national-champion Crimson Tide by a 41-24 count.
It was a loss that had less to do with preparation — Georgia led 24-20 at the half in Bryant-Denny Stadium — than Stetson Bennett’s limitations in his first season as started that Covid-effected season.
Alabama converted two third-quarter interceptions into touchdown drives to take control of the game on a night Bennett — making only his third career start — had five passes batted down at the line of scrimmage.
Crowd noise and hostile noise have seemingly not affected Georgia offenses under Smart — the Bulldogs work on crowd noise throughout the season, not just during bye weeks.
Kirby’s bye week secrets
Sam Pittman has led Arkansas to eight consecutive wins with more than a week to prepare, dating back to his second season as the Razorbacks’ head coach.
Pittman said he applied the same bye week approach as Smart, having worked under him at Georgia as offensive line coach and assistant head coach leading into his Arkansas tenure
“We’ve kind of taken that model here, as well, and I don’t believe we’ve(recently) lost a game off a bye week, either,” Pittman said on Wednesday. " I don’t know that (the approach) is unique, and I’m pretty sure Kirby doesn’t want me to share it so I;m not going to.”
But, Pittman was able to elaborate, there are many components to Smart’s approach.
“It’s a time to get your kids healthy, it’s also a time to prepare for your opponent and a time to practice the kids that don’t play quite as much,” Pittman said. “Bottom line is Coach (Smart) does an outstanding job in all phases ….
“He does a wonderful job of understanding his personnel and his team and who to continue put a little bit of wear and tear on and who not to,” Pittman said. “I think Coach Smart understands his team as good as anybody in America and the mentality they have, and I think you give him another week to watch film on an opponent, he’s very, very dangerous.
“So I would imagine all those things put together is why he’s had so much success.”
Alabama bye week approach
Kalen DeBoer has had a great run of success with more than a week to prepare for games, too.
DeBoer, in his first season at Alabama, has won 11 in a row between his time at Fresno State, Washington and now Alabama dating back to a season-opening loss to Hawaii in 2020 in his first year as a head coach in the FBS ranks.
“It’s our job to just continue to put them in the best spot, helping them to continue to gain confidence behind them that the preparation is what’s going to lead to their success,” DeBoer said at the start of Alabama’s open week.
“That’s what we’ll do here with the bye week, using a couple days here just to relax.”
DeBoer pointed out his Tide players have been hard at it since the start of fall camp and have needed time to unwind.
“Kind of, decompress a little bit,” he said. “Seven weeks now, these guys have been going. I know it’s only been three games in the season, but they’ve been going for seven weeks as of (Tuesday) when it comes to practices.”
School work is a priority, too, the new head coach said.
“This little time here where they can take care of some school and kind of get caught up, or just make sure they’re on pace and working ahead even in those areas that are away from football, and knock that out,” DeBoer said, “so they can do what they love and not have any distractions. Thursday, Friday, we’ll get back on the practice field.”
Georgia players’ bye week take
Smart sent tailback Trevor Etienne and linebackers Chaz Chambliss and Jalon Walker out to talk to the media on Tuesday.
Each of the team leaders provided their own messaging on what Georgia needed to do during the bye week.
“We haven’t been playing the Georgia brand of football,” Etienne said. “Our biggest thing as a whole, just execution, that’s something we can do better as a team, in all three phases.”
Walker, coming off a game that saw him generate eight QB pressures, said a Georgia defense that hasn’t allowed a touchdown through three games can be even better.
“We need to improve on tackling, we had a poor tackling game,” Walker said. “The past teams we’ve had were were better tackling teams …. so going into our bye week, we’ll have better thuds, better footwork and get into leverage and pursuit.
“We call it going to the doctor, that’swhat we did, we went to the doctor to see what we had going on, and it was our tackling.”
Chambliss, one of four senior starters on defense, stressed the need for young players to make the most of the extra work they received during the bye week.
“I think one thing we always want to see improvement on is depth — it’s SEC ball, this is a long road we have, it’s a long schedule, it’s a hard schedule,” Chambliss said. “We need younger guys to step up and guys to fill in positions.
“You can’t predict when people will go down, we need depth at every single position. We’re trying to preach that to the young guys right now, that they need to get ready now, it’s not a time to wait until next year.”
Indeed, the early season momentum is on the line in Tuscaloosa, and Smart and his players are determined to make the most out of every rep leading up to the Sept. 28 showdown.
Kirby’s 21-game win streak with more than week to prepare
2019 season
At Vanderbilt, 30-0, Nashville, Aug. 31
At Tennessee, 43-14, Knoxville, Oct. 5
Vs. Florida, 24-17, Jacksonville, Nov. 2
Vs. Baylor, 26-14, New Orleans, Jan. 1, 2020
2020
At Arkansas, 37-10, Fayetteville, Sept. 26
At Kentucky, 14-3, Lexington, Oct. 31
Vs. Mississippi St., 31-24, Athens, Nov. 21
At Missouri, 49-14, Columbia, Dec. 12
Vs. Cincinnati, 24-21, Atlanta, Jan. 1, 2021
2021
Vs. Clemson, 10-3, Charlotte, N.C., Sept. 4
Vs. Florida, 34-7, Jacksonville, Oct. 30
Vs. Michigan, 34-11, Miami Gardens, Dec. 31
Vs. Alabama, 33-18, Indianapolis, Jan. 10, 2022
2022
Vs. Oregon, 49-3, Atlanta, Sept. 3
Vs. Florida, 42-20, Jacksonville, Oct. 29
Vs. Ohio State, 42-41, Atlanta, Dec. 31
Vs. TCU, 65-7, Inglewood, Jan. 9, 2023
2023
Vs. UT-Martin, 48-7, Athens, Sept. 2
Vs. Florida, 43-20, Jacksonville, Oct. 28
Vs. Florida State, 63-3, Miami Gardens, Dec. 30
2024
Vs. Clemson, 34-3, Atlanta, Aug. 31
At Alabama, Tuscaloosa Sept. 28
