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AJC > Sports > UGA > Blog > Archives > 2007 > November > 18
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Winning the old-school way
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
An oft-quoted football truism has it that if you turn the ball over a lot (like four times) in a game, you can’t win. But that bit of conventional wisdom was trumped Saturday by another football truism.
Prolific offenses are great, but defense wins in the SEC.
The single most glaring statistic coming out of the Bulldogs’ win over the Kentucky Wildcats was this: Georgia gave Kentucky the ball twice on fumbles and twice on interceptions, but the Cats couldn’t garner more than three points out of those opportunities.
Most folks expected the Georgia-Kentucky game to be a high-scoring offensive shootout, but the Dawgs won Saturday the old-fashioned UGA way: Defense, special teams and the running game.
Two of those three aspects of Georgia’s game had been suspect over the past couple of seasons, but they got the job done against Kentucky. The Dawgs’ D still isn’t consistent enough to be one of those intimidating shut-em-down defenses. Georgia did shut down Kentucky’s running game but, frankly, they didn’t pressure QB Andre Woodson enough Saturday and still tended to play soft in the secondary, allowing the Cats to wrack up way too many passing yards. Which was frustrating for the fans at Sanford Stadium, because when the Dawgs DID pressure Woodson, it generally worked: five sacks and quite a few overthrown balls.
But the bottom line is that all those passing yards translated to only 13 points and, more importantly, the Georgia defense didn’t let the mistakes by the Bulldog offense throw the game away. And the Dawgs held what had been the nation’s 14th-ranked scoring offense to its season low and nearly 25 points below its season average.
Game ball to Willie Martinez and the defensive Dawgs.
As for the offense, fine running by Knowshon Moreno and Thomas Brown made up for the offensive line’s erratic blocking and QB Matthew Stafford and offensive coordinator Mike Bobo both having off days. Stafford, who often threw in a hurry or off his heels, was just a bit off-target most of the game, making his receivers work for it on even simple, short throws by tending to put the ball slightly behind them.
And probably because of their success with it in the previous three games, Bobo and Stafford seemed to have fallen in love with the homerun ball, repeatedly going long with low-percentage throws against an excellent Kentucky secondary when a nice over-the-middle to the tight end or dump pass to a back to secure a first down would have sufficed. At times Saturday when Georgia was trailing by 10 points, Bobo and Stafford looked impatient, like they wanted to get the Dawgs back on top with a big play instead of grinding it out.
Georgia ended up not completing a pass play over 17 yards. But thanks to the running game and the defense, along with Kelin Johnson’s blocked punt and Brandon Coutu’s 28th field goal out of 31 attempts at Sanford Stadium in his career, Georgia still was able to put Kentucky away and claim a share of the SEC East title.
Quite a turnaround from six weeks earlier when the Music City Bowl loomed after that pasting by Tennesee.
As for those two losses, there’s not much you can say about the Knoxville game. Georgia just didn’t show up that day. But after the past four games, more than one Georgia fan was seen shaking their heads and muttering something like, “How did this team ever lose to South Carolina?”
Dropped passes and a young team maturing as the season progressed is the answer.
If they played again today, what do you think the chances are Steve “It’s Not Like They’re Some Powerful Team” Spurrier’s fading Gamecocks would win again? Unfortunately, you don’t get mulligans in college football.
So we’re left rooting for Kentucky next week. Which, to be honest, most Georgia fans probably would be doing anyway. But even if UT wins out and goes to Atlanta, Mark Richt’s improbable rescue operation with this year’s Bulldogs has been remarkable and produced some memories for the ages.
Now, on to Historic Grant Field!
POOCH KICKS: Despite the fact that Georgia didn’t really push Richt’s offhand idea for a “redout” by fans Saturday, the stands did look a bit more ablaze in red than usual. … They did a countdown of the season’s Top 10 plays so far on the big video screen Saturday. The No. 1 “play”? The Dawgs hurtling through the “G” banner wearing those black jerseys last week. … Moreno’s second-effort continued to pay off Saturday, and Brown had several really nice slicing runs. But the run many of us got the biggest kick out of was Stafford lumbering 10 yards for a TD. He actually put a move on a Kentucky defender and juked him! … The Sanford crowd wasn’t quite as raucous as the week before against Auburn, but it stayed into the game and definitely was a factor, as Kentucky coach Rich Brooks noted when he said, “It’s harder on the road to get of a snap with all the noice. We didn’t do well with the noise factor.”
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