Both personnel experiments seemed to work on Saturday, so Georgia will try it again at Auburn.
The plan at quarterback this week will again be to play Greyson Lambert and Brice Ramsey, along with sprinkling in Terry Godwin and Sony Michel in the Wildcat, coach Mark Richt said Sunday.
It will also be status quo on the offensive line, where a revamped lineup – along with the usage of Godwin and Michel – helped produce 300 rushing yards in a 27-3 win over Kentucky.
Richt said he thought they “would have an element” of the Wildcat, which saw Godwin, a freshman receiver, rush for the team’s first touchdown in nearly a month, and helped Michel to a 165-yard rushing day.
As for traditional quarterbacks, Richt didn’t say who would start Saturday, just saying “we’ll go into this week thinking we’ll go with Greyson and Brice.” Lambert started and finished Saturday’s game, with Ramsey getting two series. It was supposed to be more of a rotation but Lambert ended up playing the entire second half because the Bulldogs were ahead.
“If we were having success we were just gonna kinda keep with who was in there,” Richt said. “It wasn’t so much a hot hand as it was the continuity of how things were going. So that was really the main thing.”
Then there’s the line, where sophomore Dyshon Sims figures to get a second straight start at right guard, but former starter Greg Pyke will see action as well, just as he did against Kentucky. Isaiah Wynn will also stay at left tackle, at least at the outset, with John Theus at right tackle and Kolton Houston at left guard.
“We’re gonna continue with the experiment,” Richt said. “We’ll start the week with this lineup and see if we can continue to get better.”
Georgia’s offensive line had been a surprising disappointment this season, but the new lineup saw positive results against Kentucky – which is the SEC’s fourth-worst run defense this year, so that may have had something to do with it. But Auburn is the fourth-worst run defense in the SEC, and has the worst total defense, going by the stats, even after a good performance Saturday at Texas A&M.
So the Bulldogs, after averaging 5.7 yards a carry against Kentucky, so they don’t see much reason to change up. But Richt did volunteer that both the pass and run blocking could have been better, and not just because of the offensive line.
“We looked at the film and saw a lot of yards we left on the field,” Richt said. “There were moments we could have blocked better on the perimeter, or if we had cut off the backside more … And a few times the backs didn’t hit it quite where you’d hope they would. But for the most part we ran the ball well. We had too many passes considering we didn’t throw that many passes, where the quarterback was either having somebody in his face or actually getting hit as he was throwing. A couple of them were guys just getting flat-out beat. It wasn’t the blitz.”
Reggie Davis update
Receiver and punt returner Reggie Davis may be able to play against Auburn after missing almost all of the Kentucky game. Davis left after a first-quarter punt return with what initially appeared to be a concussion.
“They never came back and said it was a concussion. So I’m not saying it is or it isn’t. But it’s not been reported to me that it was,” Richt said. “So hopefully it’s just something that was short term and hopefully he’ll be fine to play.”
Davis is the team’s fourth-leading receiver this season and has also been the main punt returner.
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