ATHENS – For decades, Georgia has been known as a special teams wonder. The Bulldogs have almost always had exceptional kickers and returners. Traditionally they have been among the SEC leaders in most special teams categories.
All of which makes the Bulldogs' across-the-board struggles this season that much more surprising.
Georgia isn't just sub-par in one aspect or another of special teams play. It has been bad in everything – kicking, punting, returning and covering.
"First of all, we know we have got to get better," Georgia coach Mark Richt said. "There's two things in my opinion that it could be: Either it's what we are doing schematically or it's who do we have on those teams. I guess it could be a third thing: Are they actually doing what we are asking them to do? In all those areas, we must improve."
It's not as if they haven't had a chance to address it. With the regular season and a league championship game behind them, the Bulldogs enter the Jan. 2 Outback Bowl in the bottom third of the SEC in five main statistical categories.
Georgia is seventh among the 12 SEC teams in kickoff returns, eighth in kickoff coverage, ninth in punt returns, 11th in punting and 11th in field goal kicking.
What's more, this occurred in a season in which it was anticipated the Bulldogs would own the special teams edge every week. After all, punter Drew Butler was a past All-American and Ray Guy Award winner. Placekicker Blair Walsh was a Lou Groza Award finalist. Brandon Boykin was a record-setting kick returner.
"We knew we had a great punter, great kicker, holder, snapper and all that kind of thing," Richt said. "But we also knew we had some youth on some of those teams. We lost (Akeem) Dent, (Darryl) Gamble, (Demarcus) Dobbs and some other guys that could protect, escape and run and tackle a guy in the open field. We lost a batch of those guys."
Whatever the case, special teams cost the Dogs dearly in two of their three losses this season. A 68-yard touchdown run on a fake punt by defensive tackle Melvin Ingram and a missed 33-yard field goal by Walsh were the difference in a 45-42 loss to South Carolina.
Georgia was in control against LSU in the SEC Championship game until Tyrann Mathieu broke loose for a touchdown on a 62-yard punt return late in the second quarter. The "Honey Badger" set up another touchdown on another long return and ended up with 119 yards return yards that day. Meanwhile, Walsh also missed a 45-yard field goal in the first quarter of that game.
Georgia also won despite its special team failures as well. A blocked punt in the final seconds of the Vanderbilt game nearly turned into a game-winning touchdown for the Commodores, who lost 33-28. And a Florida kickoff return for a touchdown didn't end up costing the Bulldogs, who came from behind for a 24-20 victory.
"We were kind of just mediocre a lot of games and some games we did OK," said Boykin, Georgia's career leader in kickoff returns with 2,593 yards. "A lot of things didn't go our way on special teams this year. It hasn't been up to par with what we wanted, but we won games and that's all that matters."
Boykin and Walsh have had subpar seasons by their standards. Walsh, who is second in SEC and UGA history with 404 points, is 19-of-31 on field goal attempts (61.3 percent). He missed only five attempts in his sophomore and junior seasons combined.
Boykin is one of only three players in SEC history with four kickoff returns for touchdowns, joining Tennessee's Willie Gault and Arkansas' Felix Jones. But he's 10th in the league in return average this season at 22.9 yards and hasn't been able take on all the way back this season.
"Just getting one [TD return] is hard in your career, so I knew it wouldn't come easy," Boykin said. "I had a couple of opportunities early in the season. I've tried to be patient. Having one game left to go, I'm still confident that this could be the game and I could have a storybook ending to my career, getting the last one and getting the record."
Whatever happens, Richt acknowledges that some sort of overhaul is in order. Often fans have called for him to designate one assistant coach as a special teams coordinator. It has been Richt's philosophy to divvy up the responsibilities of each unit between several assistants.
Richt is not ready to say he'll re-think his organizational structure. But he said improving special teams play will be a major focus in the offseason.
"I think there's going to be a high sense of urgency on our special teams to become more than just decent," Richt said. "We need to become really good. One of the biggest things that we try to become is one of the top teams in the league and the country in special teams play. There will be some very heavy discussions about it. We'll probably do more special teams work in the spring than we've done in the past."
SPECIAL TEAMS COMPARISON
Georgia's SEC ranking in main special teams categories:
2010-------Category---------2011
1st (46.4)---Kickoff coverage----8th (44.1)
2nd (40.6)---Punting (net)------11th (34.8)
3rd (83.3)----FG percentage----11th (60.6)
5th (10.6)----Punt returns-------9th (6.7)
10th (20.7)----Kickoff returns----7th (22.4)
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