Dogs try to avoid post-Florida letdown

Lexington, Ky. —- After back-to-back games against the past two national champions, Georgia this afternoon plays a team that hasn’t won a national title since 1950, if then.

Kentucky isn’t Georgia’s only opponent today, though.

The Bulldogs also will have to battle any hangover from last week’s crushing loss to Florida and any letdown from a season with abruptly reduced possibilities.

So, upset warning lights will be flashing when Georgia, a humbled 10 1/2-point favorite, meets Kentucky at Commonwealth Stadium.

“You have to just throw away Florida and focus on this game,” Georgia cornerback Asher Allen said, “because if you don’t, you will lose.”

Even before last week’s meltdown, today’s game posed the threat of a letdown because of its position on Georgia’s schedule: after the much-hyped games against 2007 national champion LSU and 2006 champ Florida, and before games against rivals Auburn and Georgia Tech.

In contrast to LSU and Florida, Kentucky claims one not-so-recent —- and not-so-clear-cut —- national title.

The Wildcats beat Oklahoma in the Sugar Bowl following the 1950 season and were ranked No. 1 in the final Sagarin poll. The dozen or so other polls in existence at the time, most of which considered only regular-season games, did not rank Kentucky No. 1.

You can be sure Georgia’s players aren’t aware of what happened in 1950.

The question, though, is whether they have put aside what happened last weekend.

They say they have, although only today’s game can answer definitively.

“You definitely don’t want to let a team beat you twice,” Allen said.

Translation: You don’t want to let Florida beat you in the Kentucky game.

“If Kentucky is to beat us this weekend,” Georgia coach Mark Richt said, “I want it to be because Kentucky beat us and not because we weren’t able to rally the troops.”

Linebacker Rennie Cur-ran: “We can’t allow the Florida game to ruin the rest of the season.”

Georgia’s players and coaches say they were encouraged by the attitude in the locker room and on the practice field this week. Richt said Monday was “a tough day for everybody,” but added that by Tuesday and Wednesday the practices had “a good edge to them.”

Although last week’s loss ended Georgia’s goal of a national championship, Allen said the intensity and speed in practice actually increased this week.

Kentucky is not Florida or LSU, but the Bulldogs (7-2, 4-2 SEC) seem to see the danger in the Wildcats (6-3, 2-3):

> The past two games between the teams have been close, Georgia losing 24-20 in Lexington in 2006 and overcoming a 10-0 deficit to win 24-13 in Athens last year.

“Yes,” Richt said, “we’ll remind [the players] of what happened two years ago.”

> This season, Kentucky lost to No. 1-ranked Alabama by three points —- one week after Georgia trailed the Crimson Tide by 31 at the half and lost by 11.

“Knowing they were within three points of Alabama and knowing how Alabama was able to play us,” Allen said, “it’s no problem getting up for this team.”

> And even Kentucky’s 63-5 shellacking by Florida looks different to the Dogs than it might have looked before their own 49-10 whipping by the Gators.

“A common theme of the Florida Gators,” Richt said. “Took it to [Kentucky] pretty good, as they did to us.”

Today the teams that Florida beat by a cumulative score of 112-15 the past two weeks will sort things out between themselves.

“The best way to get a loss out of your system,” Georgia fullback Brannan Southerland said, “is to go out there and get a win.”

“I’m just glad,” Richt said, “we don’t have an open date.”

NEXT FOR GEORGIA

> Who: at Kentucky

> When: 12:30 p.m. today

> TV; radio: WATL; 750 AM