Walsh stays perfect as Bulldogs eke out win at home

By Tim Tucker

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

ATHENS -- The defense played better. The turnovers continued. And, most important, Blair Walsh stayed perfect.

Walsh made his eighth field goal in eight attempts this season, a 37-yarder as the game ended, to give Georgia a dramatic 20-17 victory over Arizona State on a soggy Saturday night in Sanford Stadium.

“This is the greatest experience of my career, to have the chance at the game-winner and to hit it,” said Walsh, a sophomore. “This is my first game-winner in high school or college. ... I was just trying to think of it as another kick. Just make it. Nothing crazy.”

Walsh’s kick extended Georgia’s winning streak to three games despite a series of second-half turnovers -- a fumble followed by two interceptions -- that handed Arizona State 14 points and almost the game.

Georgia’s third turnover of the night, its 12th of the four-game-old season, gave the Sun Devils the ball at the UGA 20 with 5-1/2 minutes to play and the game tied at 17.

But the embattled Georgia defense, which had taken the brunt of the blame for the Bulldogs allowing 78 points in the previous two games, allowed less than nothing (minus-1 yard) on the next three plays, forcing a field-goal attempt from the 21.

Then A.J. Green -- playing on the field-goal defense because of his jumping ability -- blocked the kick to preserve the tie and give Georgia a shot at a dramatic victory.

Quarterback Joe Cox, shaking off the two interceptions, drove the Dogs down the field. A 36-yard pass to Green got the Dogs to the Arizona State 22, setting up the game-winning field goal four plays later from the 19.

“That was a great play,” Cox said of Green’s catch. “He is special, and he makes plays.”

Then “Ol’ Blair just drills it,” Georgia coach Mark Richt said afterward. “I’m real proud of him.”

Richt was proud of the defense, too. “The defense played, I thought, lights out, quite frankly,” he said. It put more pressure on the quarterback than in the past two games and held Arizona State to 204 yards.

Fourteen of the 17 ASU points resulted from turnovers -- a Caleb King fumble in the third quarter that set up an eight-play, 37-yard touchdown drive and, minutes later, an interception of a Cox pass returned 47 yards for a touchdown.

Otherwise, Arizona State mustered only a first-quarter field goal.

Georgia, which had trailed by double-digits in the first quarter of the past two games, took a 14-3 first-quarter lead in this one.

A 56-yard pass play from Cox to Green -- Green caught it around the 25 and sidestepped a safety on the way to the end zone -- produced the first score. A 2-yard run by Fred Munzenmaier produced the second. The 14-3 lead held until third quarter, when Georgia’s turnovers put the game in peril.

Arizona State led 17-14 after the second turnover, but Walsh’s first field goal of the night -- a 21-yarder early in the fourth quarter -- tied the score at 17.

Georgia improved to 3-1 on the season despite being minus-9 in turnover ratio.

“We have certainly been tested,” Richt said. “We have had to exert every ounce of energy to win these last three ballgames, there is no doubt about that.

“The good news is, at the very end, we’ve been winning. We’d like to remove some of the drama if possible.”