In a rush, Georgia defeats Georgia Tech

By Doug Roberson

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Kade Weston carried the giant, black Georgia flag and planted it at Georgia Tech's 40-yard line. Bragging rights are going back to Athens.

Washaun Ealey and Caleb King combined to rush for 349 yards, and Georgia defeated Georgia Tech 30-24 on Saturday in the 104th edition of the rivalry nicknamed "Clean, Old-Fashioned Hate." The Bulldogs have won eight of the past nine against the No. 7 Yellow Jackets.

The victory wraps up a difficult regular season for the Bulldogs, characterized by meltdowns against Florida and Tennessee and punctuated with a loss to Kentucky in Athens last weekend.

But Georgia (7-5) won Saturday by doing the things that it hadn't been able to do consistently all season: hold onto the ball (one turnover), minimize its penalties (five), and play with discipline on offense and defense.

Now, coach Mark Richt, his staff and players will find out Dec. 6 which bowl wants them.

"Considering how our season has gone and playing one of the hottest teams in America -- one of the best teams in America -- in their house, to get the victory I thought was a great tribute to the Georgia football program," Richt said.

The Jackets' eight-game win streak ended because they couldn't do the things with which they were accustomed: control the clock (Georgia won that stat, 30:03-29:57), play defense well enough (the Bulldogs totaled 415 yards), and use big plays (Georgia had four plays longer than 20 yards, to Tech's three).

Georgia Tech (10-2) now turns its attention to the ACC Championship game and Clemson on Dec. 5 in Tampa. The winner will play in the Orange Bowl on Jan. 5.

"Our No. 1 goal was to try to win the ACC," Tech coach Paul Johnson said. "But we're really disappointed. We all understood it was a big game. We all wanted to win the game."

This year's game between the Bulldogs and Yellow Jackets was every bit as exciting as last year's, in which Tech scored 33 points in the second half to rally for a 45-42 victory.

Tech's chances of going to Tampa with a nine-game win streak, and Georgia's chances to saving a disappointing season, came down to fourth-and-10 with a little more than a minute left. Tech had the ball after Blair Walsh yanked a career-long 54-yard field goal to the left.

The Yellow Jackets  moved to Georgia's 46, converting a fourth-and-1 with 1:53 remaining.

After three long incompletions, one to the left to Demaryius Thomas, one to the right to Stephen Hill and one down the middle to Anthony Allen, Tech faced fourth-and-10 with 1:28 remaining.

Nesbitt rolled left and spotted Thomas alone on the left sideline with a yard to spare for the first down. The pass hit Thomas in the  hands. He dropped it. He appeared to look down to make sure his feet were inbounds as the ball arrived. Johnson said he called four consecutive pass plays because he had just one timeout left.

Nesbitt said he told Thomas after the game to remember that he is one of the reasons that Tech will be playing for a conference title next game.

"We still got a lot of football to play," said Nesbitt, who passed for 135 yards and rushed for 41 more. "We need him."

Georgia only needed more King and Ealey. The duo led Georgia to a 17-3 lead at halftime by combining to rush for 205 yards in the half, 88 more than Tech was allowing in a game this season.

"It was real exciting that Coach kept running the ball," said Ealey, a true freshman whose previous career high was 98 yards against Auburn two weeks ago. "We watched film and thought if we got in the [Georgia Tech] secondary, they try to arm tackle."

One of the better examples came after Thomas sprinted 76 yards to cut Georgia's lead to 17-10 with less than two minutes gone in the second half.

On  Georgia's  next play from scrimmage, Tech put all 11 players within 10 yards of the line of scrimmage. King ran up the middle, cut back left and breezed past all of them for a 75-yard touchdown to stretch Georgia's lead back to 14 points, 24-10.

"We knew we wanted to run the ball, control the clock, keep the ball away from Georgia Tech as long as we couldn," Richt said. "It was a great job of blocking up front. And I know our tight ends blocked well, our receivers blocked well."

But the Yellow Jackets still weren't done. They came back with a 12-play, 80-yard drive capped by a 5-yard scoring run up the middle by Jonathan Dwyer to cut Georgia's lead to 24-17 with 6:29 remaining in the third quarter.

But in the end Georgia had too much King and Ealey, who outrushed Tech by 134 yards.

Now, Georgia gets to talk for the next 365 days.

"We came back and finished up strong against a team that no one gave us a chance to beat," Georgia quarterback Joe Cox said. "