ATHENS — Kirby Smart has won 18 straight games when given more than a week to prepare for an opponent, which is the case this week for the Georgia-Florida rivalry.
Smart has a process for most everything, and while he’s always looking to improve and modify, the Bulldogs’ head coach rarely makes radical changes.
Georgia just keeps on hammering away, holding what NFL scouts have said are the hardest practices in college football.
Florida second-year coach Billy Napier, however, believes he may have found a competitive edge thanks to his experience coaching in the Sun Belt.
Napier recently shared how he applied a different bye-week approach leading into the 3:30 p.m. game on Saturday.
“I think one of the benefits of playing in the Sun Belt is you get a chance to play in a lot of midweek games, have unique schedules,” said Napier, who landed the Gators’ job after being named Sun Belt Conference Coach of the Year two of his four years leading the Louisiana program.
“I think we’ve come up with a blueprint we’ve used in the past that we’ll use this week. Ultimately excited about that. Be the first time we’ve done that. I think it will be good for the players and the staff.”
Napier found success in a 41-39 road win at South Carolina the Gators’ last time out after having his team place “a huge emphasis on sleep” the week leading up to the game.
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More of that same mentality — ensuring plenty of rest and recovery time — might again be in place.
“There’s not only a physical break here, but there’s a mental break as well,” Napier said this week.
Napier used weaponry to make his point on the benefits of being rested and ready.
“Physically you’ve got to have a sharp sword,” Napier said. “You’ve got to be ready to go. That axe can’t be dull.”
Smart, in his eighth-year as the Bulldogs’ head coach, has not lost with more than seven days to prepare since Texas upset UGA following the 2018 season in the Sugar Bowl, 28-21.
UGA applies an “iron sharpens iron” rule, and Georgia rarely taking things easy while maintaining a competitive mode each time out.
“Not all practices are the same, we have a routine and a method to our madness,” Smart said. “There’s expectations at every practice, it doesn’t matter if it’s a walk-through in helmets, shorts or pads. There’s a standard the players have to uphold.”
Georgia will put that standard on the line — along with the No. 1-ranking and 24-game win streak — when it faces what promises to be a well-rested Florida team in Jacksonville on Saturday.
