AUSTIN, Texas — Heading to Texas to play the No. 1-ranked Longhorns on Saturday, Georgia coach Kirby Smart said he wasn’t worried about stakes. He just wanted to see the Bulldogs play their best game.
Well, Georgia certainly did not play its best game, but still it managed to beat the nation’s No. 1 team on its home field. And the Bulldogs did so in mostly convincing fashion, some controversial officiating notwithstanding.
With the 30-15 victory before a record crowd of 105,215 at Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium, the Bulldogs improved to 4-5 all-time against top-ranked teams. It marked the first time that UGA faced a No. 1 team in a true road game.
More important, the Bulldogs dramatically improved their prospects for the rest of the season.
“Our intent was to come eat and be hungry,” said Kirby Smart, who secured his 100th victory as Georgia’s coach. “I’m not interested in bells and whistles. What I want is a team that fights their (expletive) off, and that’s what they did tonight.”
With a pair of games against top-4 opponents now under their belts, No. 5 Georgia has proved its prowess as one of the country’s best teams. They led No. 4 Alabama with 2:31 to play. Now the Bulldogs (6-1, 4-1 SEC) have a week off to get ready for their annual trip to Jacksonville to face Florida. On the other side awaits another difficult stretch that will include matchups against No. 18 Ole Miss on the road and No. 11 Tennessee at home.
This win rids the Bulldogs of the anxiety to be perfect for the final six-game stretch. But the way the game went down underscores that improvement must continue.
Ultimately, Georgia owed this victory to its defense. Maligned and criticized for much of the season, the Bulldogs’ defense limited the Longhorns to 259 yards and recorded four takeaways on three fumble recoveries and an interception. UGA got all-star performances from linebacker Jalon Walker, who led the team with eight tackles and three sacks and was credited with four quarterback pressures; cornerback Daylen Everette, who added seven tackles, forced a fumble on a sack and recorded an interception; and defensive end Mykel Williams, who finished with two sacks after playing only single-figure snaps in each of the past three games because of injuries.
It was a thorough humbling of a Texas team that came in undefeated and was picked by virtually every national analyst at ESPN to beat the Bulldogs.
“We can sit here and feel sorry for ourselves, but that’s not good for us,” Texas coach Steve Sarkisian said afterward. “We need to recalibrate and get back on that horse and start that ride again.”
Leading 23-0 at halftime, Georgia nearly blew the whole thing in one of the craziest second halves one will ever see. The most bizarre of several unusual plays was the decision by the SEC refereeing crew to overturn a pass-interference call against the Longhorns.
When the call initially was made at the 2:48 mark of the third quarter, it nullified an interception and long return by Texas cornerback Jahdae Barron. But after replays were shown in the stadium, fans littered the field with cups, bottles and trash. During the nearly five-minute delay that resulted while cheerleaders and game-operations personnel rushed in to clean the field, the referees huddled and, ultimately, overturned the call.
Not only that, the officials put another 12 seconds on the clock. Understandably, Smart was furious and protested the call to the head official. Nevertheless, the Longhorns were rewarded first-and-goal at Georgia’s 9. They needed only one play to score on a slant pass to wide receiver Jadon Blue. That made the score 23-15 with 2:12 still remaining in the third quarter.
“I will say that now we’ve set a precedent that if you throw a bunch of stuff on the field and endanger athletes, that you’ve got a chance to get your call reversed,” Smart said. “And that’s unfortunate, because to me, that’s dangerous. That’s not what we want. That’s not criticizing officials. That’s what happened.”
The SEC issued a statement about the incident after the game. It read:
“With 3:12 to play in the third quarter of the Georgia at Texas game, Texas intercepted a pass at the Texas 46-yard line and returned it to the Texas 9-yard line. Texas was flagged for committing defensive pass interference on the play which resulted in Georgia maintaining the ball with a first down.
“The game officials gathered to discuss the play, which is permitted to ensure the proper penalty is enforced, at which time the calling official reported that he erred, and a foul should not have been called for defensive pass interference. Consequently, Texas was awarded the ball at the Texas 9-yard line.
“While the original evaluation and assessment of the penalty was not properly executed, it is unacceptable to have debris thrown on the field at any time.
“The disruption of the game due to debris being thrown onto the field will be reviewed by the conference office related to SEC sportsmanship policies and procedures.”
Georgia also had two players disqualified for targeting in safety Dan Jackson and nickel back Joenel Aguero. As a result, each defensive back will have to sit out the first half of the Florida game Nov. 2.
“They tried to rob us with the calls in this place,” Smart said. “But these guys are just so resilient.”
The Longhorns’ second-half comeback started with a strange kickoff by Peyton Woodring. Inexplicably, the intent was to squib it, which is a hard kick that’s supposed to stay on the ground. But Woodring mishit the ball and it went straight into the center of Texas’ front line. The Longhorns recovered and took over at the Texas 45.
It took them eight plays and two Georgia personal-foul penalties, but Texas turned the mishap into points as Buford resident Isaiah Bond’s scored on a 1-yard reception. Another pass to Bond gave Texas a two-point conversion, and that cut Georgia’s lead to 23-8 just four minutes into the third quarter.
While the story of the game was Georgia’s defense, which held quarterback Quinn Ewers in check most of the night, the Bulldogs offense deserves a lot of credit, too. With the outcome in doubt, quarterback Carson Beck led Georgia on an 11-play, 89-yard touchdown that gave them a chance for a second breath with a 15-point lead and 12:04 to play.
The drive included a 12-yard completion to Arian Smith on third-and-10 at Georgia’s 10. Back-to-back completions to Dillon Bell – the second aided with a facemask penalty – gave the Bulldogs first-and-goal at the 7. On fourth-and-goal, running back Trevor Etienne scored from a half-yard out. The PAT made the score 30-15.
It was Etienne’s third touchdown of the night. He led the Bulldogs with 87 yards on 19 carries.
“We try not to pay attention to the outside noise,” said Etienne, a first-year transfer from Florida. “We just try to come out and compete.”
It also was Georgia’s 10th fourth-down conversion in a row, and the Bulldogs improved to 11-of-12 on that down this season.
In many ways, it was a rough night for Beck. He finished with 175 yards passing, but he had 18 incompletions, three interceptions and no touchdowns. Arian Smith led the Bulldogs with six catches for 32 yards, but the Bulldogs were plagued all night by drops.
“It was crazy. There was a lot of stuff that happened,” Beck said. “We learned you just can’t look at the scoreboard. The biggest thing is to just keep playing and doing what we know we can do.”
Ewers also had a tough evening. He finished with 211 yards on 25-of-43 passing, but 194 of that came after halftime as the Longhorns desperately tried to come back. Ewers struggled so much in the first half that he was replaced by redshirt freshman Arch Manning. Manning finished 3-of-6 passing for 19 yards. Georgia’s defense sacked the Texas quarterbacks seven times for 59 yards in losses.
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