Maybe you’re like me. Maybe you’ve spent at least five seconds of your life considering the question: If Thor and the Hulk got into a fight, who’d win? (Answer: Thor.) And maybe, having pondered one cosmic issue, you turn to another. Namely, how would it look if the best football team in the land played the worst?
Answer: It would look the way the first quarter of Georgia-Vanderbilt looked.
After 11 minutes and 52 seconds, Georgia led 35-0. It had gained 208 yards to Vandy’s 11. The Bulldogs scored five touchdowns before their opponent managed a first down.
This wasn’t a day when the better team wore down the lesser squad. This was a day when all-around excellence overwhelmed across-the-board ineptitude. Coaches want their teams to play to its potential, no matter the opponent. Georgia came close to maximizing its resplendent resources in this first quarter. It did whatever it wanted. It gave the Commodores nothing. It entertained itself by allowing its receivers – tight end Brock Bowers, then wideout Ladd McConkey – to score rushing touchdowns.
The final score was 62-0. Had the Bulldogs felt the urge, they might have gone for 80 or 90. Starting quarterback JT Daniels was done before the first quarter ended. Backup Stetson Bennett yielded to Carson Beck midway through the third. Seven different Georgia players carried the ball. Nine caught passes. Vandy finished with 77 yards and four first downs. Take away three false-start penalties incurred by third-string Bulldogs inside the final eight minutes, it was close to a perfect game.
Said linebacker Nolan Smith: “We have a standard here. We try to meet that standard every game.”
Then: “At the University of Georgia, we make practices harder than the game. It’s (meaning the game) like an ease.”
Said coach Kirby Smart of his team’s preparation: “We played videos of Mike Tyson. We talked about playing to our standard and starting fast.”
Asked if anything about that first quarter could be labeled substandard, Smart said: “Kickoffs.” He was being serious. (In Jake Camarda’s defense, he kicked off six times over the game’s first 12 minutes. His leg might have been tired.)
Smith again: “We say, ‘Nobody in our end zone.’ That’s our standard … I don’t care if we’re playing the New England Patriots. We let nobody in our end zone.”
Vanderbilt didn’t move inside the Georgia 20. Maybe the real standard should be: Nobody in our red zone.
Smart again: “The biggest emphasis for us is this trajectory we want to be on. Every week, we get to reset it.”
Credit: AP
Credit: AP
He offered the example of an airplane drifting off-target. Georgia seeks to correct its flaws, infinitesimal though they might be, every week. Said Smart: “If we correct that one degree off, we can hit our target.”
Since managing no offensive touchdowns in the opening victory over Clemson, Georgia has outscored opponents 158-20. Daniels sat out the UAB game with a tweaked oblique, which made little difference. Bennett threw five touchdown passes in the first half. The Bulldogs have gotten nothing yet from the gifted receivers/tight ends George Pickens, Arik Gilbert and Darnell Washington. Hasn’t mattered. In September, no team – not even Alabama – has looked better than this.
Saturday was a game that paranoid coaches – all coaches are paranoid – dread. You’re on the road in the one SEC stadium that doesn’t feel like an SEC stadium. Kickoff’s at 11 a.m. local time. There’s no way your team can lose, but you’re still worried because … well, you’re a coach. Smart closed his postgame media session by challenging Georgia fans to show up early for the Arkansas game, which has a noon kickoff in Athens on Saturday. He said an elite team deserves elite, and apparently prompt, supporters.
The point is that Smart, who apprenticed under Nick Saban and isn’t one to laud his team overmuch, has set a higher standard for his sixth Georgia team than for any of his first five, the second of which almost won the national title. He isn’t backing away from the E-word – “elite.” Heck, he’s trotting it out himself. He mentioned it after Clemson and after Vanderbilt. He’s not blowing smoke.
No team in this nation has a mightier defense. No team is deeper. No team – not even Alabama – has a better chance of winning it all.
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