Maybe this is just Georgia’s year

Maybe Georgia loses this game if Florida quarterback DJ Lagway put a little more velocity on the throw to J. Michael Sturdivant, but I doubt it. If Lagway had thrown a touchdown pass to his wide-open target, then the Bulldogs would have figured out a way to win the game anyway.

That’s just what they do. They did it to Tennessee, Auburn and Ole Miss. The Bulldogs did it again to the Gators on Saturday in Jacksonville.

Florida gained the lead in the fourth quarter. No. 5 Georgia took it back for a 24-20 victory. The Bulldogs have won seven games this season. They trailed during the second half of four of them.

My eyes tell me the Bulldogs (7-1, 5-1) aren’t championship-caliber. Their once-mighty defense is ordinary. They don’t run the ball like Georgia teams are supposed to. Gunner Stockton saved the Bulldogs against Tennessee and Ole Miss but, surely, that well will run dry at some point.

Yet the Bulldogs keep winning despite their weaknesses. They aren’t a great team, but they are a tough team. They are lucky, but they make the most of their luck.

Maybe this is just Georgia’s year. How else to explain that missed field goal by Tennessee, Auburn’s touchdown-that-wasn’t and Lane Kiffin suddenly becoming James Coley? To that list of fortuitous developments for Georgia, add the potential go-ahead touchdown for Florida that fizzled out as an incomplete pass.

The Bulldogs have trended down since winning back-to-back national championships for the 2021 and 2022 seasons. Some regression was inevitable in 2023. But Georgia was worse in 2024 (SEC title notwithstanding) and worse still this year.

Yet the Bulldogs are 7-1 with a clear path to return to the College Football Playoff after a one-year absence. To get back to the SEC championship game, the Bulldogs will need Texas A&M to lose once (and prevail on a tiebreaker) or Alabama to lose twice. But they’ll surely be in the CFP if they win out in the regular season.

Underachieving Texas and rival Georgia Tech are the main obstacles. Georgia isn’t good enough to pencil in wins for those games. Even the game at Mississippi State next weekend could be tricky for the Bulldogs, considering Kentucky is the only SEC foe they’ve dominated. But even if those teams manage to get a late lead against the Bulldogs, they’ll have a hard time putting them away.

Georgia is a good and resilient team that has benefited from luck in some wins. There’s nothing wrong with that. Even great teams need good luck to win. If the Bulldogs improve over the final month-plus, then we’ll look back at those fortunate wins as buying time for them to get good enough to not need luck as much.

The Gators (3-5, 2-3) had a chance to end Georgia’s run of good luck. They had little to lose against Georgia except for a fifth straight game in the series. Florida fired coach Billy Napier before the bye week. In Gainesville, they’ve turned their gazes away from this lost season to stare lovingly at Kiffin.

But the Gators put up a fight against their bitter rivals. They answered Georgia’s first-quarter touchdown with a touchdown. Georgia scored a touchdown in the third quarter to go ahead 17-10. Florida tied the game again and then gained a 20-17 lead early in the fourth quarter.

Georgia’s defense isn’t supposed to have so much trouble against a bottom-tier offense. The Gators averaged 17 points scored in six previous games against FBS teams. The Gators tallied 20 points against Georgia over three quarters and change. Florida scored three of those points on a short field following Stockton’s interception, but, come on.

The Gators were threatening to score again at the end of the third quarter. Before the start of the final period, ESPN sideline reporter Katie George asked Georgia coach Kirby Smart why his team has thrived in tight games.

“Winner’s edge, competitive mentality, that’s what we’ve been about,” Smart said.

Then Smart’s team went out and proved him right again.

The Bulldogs forced Florida to try a 54-yard field goal attempt. They made it, for a 20-17 lead. Once again, the Bulldogs were down late. Once again, they won with a mixture of luck and pluck.

Georgia went three-and-out after Florida’s field goal. The Gators marched down the field again by using plays that have vexed Georgia all season: short passes and runs between the tackles. The Gators made it all the way to the red zone before Georgia made a stand.

Lagway tried to run outside on third-and-2, but he was swarmed by Georgia defenders after gaining only a yard. Interim coach Billy Gonzales decided to go for it. It was the right decision under the circumstances. Lagway handed the ball off to Jadan Baugh. That was also a good choice because the Bulldogs had struggled to stop Baugh from patiently slithering for yards.

Baugh couldn’t do it this time. The Bulldogs stopped him for no gain, because of course they did. When the game is on the line, it’s as if nothing that happened before with Georgia’s defense matters.

Georgia’s rushing offense has the same vibe as the defense. The longest run the Bulldogs managed through three quarters: 13 garbage yards by Stockton on third-and-long. So, naturally, Chauncey Bowens ran for a 36-yard touchdown to put the Bulldogs ahead 24-20 with 4:36 left.

The Gators needed to drive 69 yards for a go-ahead touchdown. The first two plays went nowhere. Lagway escaped the pocket on third down. Sturdivant streaked behind Georgia’s back line. A strong pass by Lagway might have gone for a touchdown, but the ball was underthrown.