EL PASO, Texas — On the final day of the year, Jay Finch and his teammates have a last crack at the 2011 season.
“Because after this, it’s, jeez, forever till we play another game — next September,” the Georgia Tech center said.
In search of gold and land, Spanish conquistadors came through this border city, wedged between the Rio Grande and a mountain pass that inspired its name. The Yellow Jackets have traveled to El Paso (“the pass” in Spanish) with less imperial aims — to beat Utah in Saturday’s Sun Bowl and fill the upcoming eight-month void with the satisfaction of breaking their six-game bowl losing streak.
“There’s nobody who has a lot more to prove in a bowl game specifically than Georgia Tech,” defensive end Izaan Cross said.
The Jackets may have to do it potentially without four starters. First-team All-ACC guard Omoregie Uzzi and B-back David Sims are questionable, coach Paul Johnson said Friday. Uzzi appears to be the less likely of the two to play. Those possible absences would follow cornerback Louis Young and offensive tackle Phil Smith being held out of the game for disciplinary reasons.
In his first comments about Smith — who was sent home earlier in the week for breaking team rules — Johnson said that “there’s a lot of possibilities” regarding further discipline for Smith, who also was suspended for the first two games of the season for breaking team rules.
“It was disappointing more than anything else, the nature of what happened and how it happened,” Johnson said.
Offensive tackle Morgan Bailey will sub for Smith in a three-tackle rotation with Ray Beno and Tyler Kidney, while Shaquille Mason would start for Uzzi, Johnson said. Preston Lyons would be Sims’ likely substitute.
To beat the Utes, who have won four of their past five regular-season games and nine of their past 10 bowl games, Tech likely will have to free itself of a plethora of albatrosses that have hung around the Jackets’ necks this season.
Utah’s power running game offers a chance for vindication for a Tech defense that often failed to hold up against the run, particularly in crucial moments in season-changing losses to Virginia and Virginia Tech. The Jackets will have to deal with some bruisers, notably All-Pac-12 offensive tackle Tony Bergstrom and center Tevita Stevens, who are 25 and 24 years old, respectively, after having served Mormon missions between high school and college.
They clear paths for 5-foot-8 John White, the 1,400-yard running back whom Tech defensive coordinator Al Groh praised for his durability and slithery running style.
The Tech defensive front, ends Jason Peters and Cross and tackle Logan Walls, will be charged to withstand double-teams and hold the point of attack to permit the linebackers to run free to the ball.
Particularly after 15 bowl practices, there will be no place for mental errors, communication lapses and poor tackling, which often sank the Jackets this season.
“I think if we’re going to compete, we’re going to have to stop the run,” Walls said, “so that’s what the defensive line is working hard to figure out, how to stop it.”
On the flipside, the Tech offense will have an opportunity, against the country’s No. 7-ranked run defense, no less, to offer a valedictory worthy of the nation’s No. 3 rushing offense.
The interior trio of Finch and the two guards, Will Jackson and either Mason or Uzzi, will trade welts with All-Pac-12 nose tackle Star Lotulelei and try to purge the memory of unsatisfying performances against Virginia Tech and Georgia at season’s end.
“As an offensive line, I think after the last couple games, we have something to prove,” Finch said.
Quarterback Tevin Washington can rebound from a two-interception game against the Bulldogs and re-boot the passing game that torched defenses at the start of the season, but operated intermittently thereafter.
The special teams have their own challenges. The Jackets have taken one of their 40 kickoff returns, not counting onside kicks, past midfield and rank 109th in the country at 19.3 yards per return. Utah, which ranks No. 7 in kickoff defense at 18.0 yards per return, will present a stern final exam.
The myriad obstacles that the Utes, who began Tech’s bowl slide in the 2005 Emerald Bowl, will throw in the Jackets’ path would make only more precious a Sun Bowl triumph. A win would earn Tech just its ninth nine-win season since coach Bobby Dodd’s retirement after the 1966 season, but the third in Johnson’s four-year tenure.
Utah, 60 minutes and an eight-month chasm await.
“I feel really good about it,” Washington said. “I’m ready to play.”
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