georgia football national championship repeat

All season Kirby Smart has downplayed the idea of Georgia of repeating as champions. With the Bulldogs having to replace 15 players via the NFL draft and another 13 via the transfer portal.

But the Bulldogs are squarely looking at the possibility of winning back-to-back championships in the face as they take on TCU on Monday night.

With a win, Georgia will be the first team in the College Football Playoff era to win back-to-back national championships.

But Smart’s team isn’t the first to find itself in this situation. Three times before has the reigning national champion made it to the national championship game in the following season.

And that team is 0-3 in those contests.

It first happened in 2017, when Alabama was looking to cap off a 15-0 season against the Clemson Tigers. Alabama led for a majority of the game but ran out of gas in the fourth quarter, falling to Deshaun Watson and the Tigers 35-31.

Alabama didn’t blow the lead until there was just one second remaining but the Crimson Tide was outscored 21-7 in the final quarter.

Nick Saban’s team ran into a similar problem last season against this very Georgia team. The Bulldogs lost to Alabama the first time around in the SEC championship game and seem poised to do so again in the rematch.

But a strong fourth quarter from the Bulldogs pushed Smart’s team ahead for good. Georgia won the final 15 minutes by a 20-9 margin, giving the Bulldogs a 33-18 victory.

That put them in a position to do what they are attempting on Monday night.

Georgia outscored Ohio State 18-3 in the fourth quarter to punch its ticket to Los Angeles.

“My concern is the men in our locker room,” Smart said after the win over the Buckeyes. “We played well enough to win too, just well enough to win. We played really hard in the fourth quarter.”

The 2019 Clemson Tigers similarly won a back-and-forth game against the Buckeyes, coming back from a 16-point deficit to get to the national championship game.

Awaiting them was the unbeaten LSU Tigers. TCU isn’t of the same caliber as that legendary team but the Horned Frogs are more than capable of making things difficult for Georgia. TCU upset Michigan 51-45 to advance to the championship game.

Clemson was able to hang with LSU for a bit, holding a 17-7 lead in the second quarter. But LSU hit another gear and Dabo Swinney’s squad couldn’t match. LSU won the game 42-25, outscoring Clemson 35-8 over the final 40 minutes.

TCU’s tempo is a concern for Smart, as Michigan struggled to get set and keep up with Max Duggan and the TCU offense.

“They create really tough situations defensively, do an incredible job on special teams,” Smart said of the Horned Frogs. “Have one of the best returners I’ve ever faced in the return game and score a lot of points on offense with the Heisman Trophy candidate quarterback. So it’s a recipe to be playing for the national championship.”

Both Georgia and TCU have played 15 games, which hasn’t always been the case when teams meet in the national championship game. So they’ve dealt with the same level of wear and tear. Georgia tight end Darnell Washington is questionable for the game, as is TCU’s leading rusher Kendre Miller.

Smart will want to block out any and all noise regarding the idea of repeating. It’s been his goal all season and a big reason the Bulldogs are back in this spot.

And they’ll have a chance to finish the job in a way past Clemson and Alabama could not.

“I knew the kind of year it would be,” Smart said prior to facing Ohio State. “It’s always a little tougher to bring everybody back to home base. It was much easier for us this year because we had so many players leave, and we had a hungrier young team.”

More Georgia football stories from around DawgNation