Moving to a new location
AJC blogs are moving to a new technical platform. So check out Terence Moore’s new blog home and bookmark it.
Home > Terence Moore > Archives > 2008 > August > 22 > Entry
DEL.ICIO.USWhy UGA won’t win it all: The schedule
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It’s the schedule, stupid.
Ever since Yale, Princeton and Harvard mostly alternated as national champions in the latter 19th century, nobody has been crowned the king of college football with three losses or more.
Two losses? Well, LSU had such a distinction last season. According to history, though, that was a fluke. Prior to the Tigers, no two-loss team had finished at the top of the Associated Press or United Press International polls since Minnesota. We’re talking 1960.
Now consider this: Georgia will have at least two losses, probably three, and not because of Georgia. It will be because of road games at South Carolina, Arizona State, LSU and Auburn, along with consecutive home games against Alabama and Tennessee. There also will be that little event in Jacksonville against a Florida bunch that continues to fume over the Bulldogs’ excessive Dog-pile last year after they scored the game’s first touchdown.
Oh, and did we mention the SEC championship game? If the Bulldogs make it that far, they’d likely face highly ranked LSU, Auburn or Alabama during a rematch from earlier in the year.
I know. Georgia is the rage from Sports Illustrated to the coaches’ poll. The theory is that, with all of that talent and an accomplished coaching staff, Georgia could go undefeated or lose once.
But what about the schedule?
“The way we look at it, it’s not a tough schedule that we suddenly have to deal with. For us, this is just another SEC schedule,” said Georgia cornerback Asher Allen, who has a point, but only to a point. The Bulldogs regularly have schedules in this vicinity, and they did well enough with their schedule last season to finish 11-2. Still, they didn’t reach the championship game of the Bowl Championship Series. They didn’t even win their division.
That also was a schedule without rare trips for the Bulldogs to the West (Arizona State) and to Death Valley (LSU). That also was a schedule before the Gators had a whole year to fume over Georgia’s end-zone silliness in Jacksonville. That also was a schedule lacking back-to-back SEC monster games (Alabama and Tennessee).
So, if the Bulldogs do prosper with such a schedule, they shouldn’t become kings of college football.
Try kings of the Earth.
(Editor’s note: Want a different take on how UGA’s schedule affects the Bulldogs’ chances of winning the national championship? Mark Bradley says this is the year.)
Permalink | | Categories: UGA/SEC
