In December 1989, Notre Dame was readying to face unbeaten Colorado in the Orange Bowl. TV cameras caught Lou Holtz briefing his Fighting Irish on the No. 1 Buffaloes: “They’ve been living a lie all season. … They ain’t playing any Kansas State.”
Final score: Notre Dame 21, Colorado 6.
Sometimes a shock to the system is needed, especially for a team grown fat on victories over less-than-prime opposition. Georgia had gone two months without an opponent capable of beating it -- or without taking a lead. (The last time had come against Notre Dame. Small world.) Matched against raging Auburn before a frothing Jordan-Hare audience, the Bulldogs spit the bit. They led 7-0. When next they managed a touchdown, they trailed 40-10.
It was an awful loss for any team, let alone the nation’s No. 1. But it’s not easy to steel yourselves for a big-time opponent if you haven’t seen one lately. Georgia hadn’t before Saturday. It will again soon.
It would be wrong to say that Georgia hadn’t played anybody pre-Auburn. Notre Dame was No. 3 in the College Football Playoff rankings last week and is No. 8 now; Mississippi State is No. 17. Both of those meetings, however, were in September. Four of the Bulldogs’ victories in the interim came against Tennessee, Vanderbilt, Missouri and Florida. The aggregate SEC record of those four is 5-21.
Other than Georgia, which clinched the SEC East with two games to go, the only division team that will finish above .500 in league play – assuming Georgia beats Kentucky on Saturday, which it will – is 5-3 South Carolina. Here’s the list of conference wins for the Gamecocks: Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee, Vanderbilt and Florida.
As an entity, the SEC East is as bad as it has ever been, which is saying something. Florida and Tennessee are the only programs that can approximate Georgia’s resources; they’re a collective 3-11 in SEC play, both having fired their coaches. Just as the Gators didn’t have to be very good to win the division the past two years, the Bulldogs could have been halfway decent and skated away with the East this time.
Georgia is better than halfway decent, but it wasn’t very good at Auburn. Kirby Smart botched an end-of-half scoring chance. Jim Chaney stuck with the run even though the run was going nowhere. (There were six three-and-outs.) Mel Tucker’s defense yielded 488 yards and eight scoring drives, only one of which spanned fewer than 40 yards. Nick Chubb and Sony Michel averaged 2.4 yards per rush. Jake Fromm completed 46.4 percent of his passes and was sacked four times. Malkom Parrish was exposed in coverage. Rodrigo Blankenship missed from 42 yards.
It was a comprehensive dud, which maybe we should have seen coming. Auburn had been gathering force – in hindsight, that blown lead at LSU seems a neon blip – and was primed for this game in a way Georgia couldn't have been. The Tigers had lost nine of 11 in the series. Kevin Scarbinsky of AL.com reported that departing Auburn athletic director Jay Jacobs had fussed over Gus Malzahn's apparent disinclination to prioritize the series. Be advised that Saturday's installment was prioritized.
The honorary game captain was Nick (un)Fairley, who spent the 2010 game seeking to maim Aaron Murray. The cover of the game program featured Auburn safety Tray Matthews, who as a Bulldog collided with Josh Harvey-Clemons to deflect the Prayer at Jordan-Hare. (Those were Auburn’s two wins in the series over the previous 11 years.) During a fourth-quarter timeout, the PA played “Crank That (Soulja Boy),” the song to which Georgia’s players famously danced during the 2007 Blackout victory over the Tigers.
Oh, and the serially sober-sided Malzahn was caught on tape -- have coaches learned nothing from Lou Holtz? -- saying afterward, “We beat the dog crap out of them.” (And howdy to you, Jay Jacobs!)
Auburn wanted and got its victory. If the teams meet again for the SEC championship, any pent-up fury will belong to Georgia. If the opponent in Mercedes-Benz Stadium is Alabama … well, it’s not as if the Bulldogs have had much luck against the Crimson Tide. The bitter Blackout of 2008 and the damp squib of 2015 are jagged memories; the tipped-ball ending of the epic 2012 SEC Championship game will never be forgotten.
If there’s any solace to be taken from a 23-point loss, it’s that a Georgia team that hadn’t played many Big Games since 2012 now knows what one entails. The Bulldogs weren’t ready for Auburn on Nov. 11. They’ll have no excuse not to be ready for Auburn or Alabama on Dec. 2.
This isn’t to guarantee that they’ll win, but at least they’ll know what’s coming. If any part of Georgia’s rise to No. 1 was a case of living a lie, Auburn provided a bracing slap of truth.
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