GEORGIA KEYS TO THE SEASON
Show improvement on defense. Georgia doesn't have to shut out opponents. It doesn't even have to limit them to the teens. A couple of touchdowns and a field goal or two a game would probably suffice. At the rate the Bulldogs have scored points the past couple of seasons — they averaged nearly 37 per game last season — they would need to play only moderately well on defense and limit colossal big plays to be a dominant football team.
Despite the offseason player attrition and complete turnover of the defensive coaching staff, Georgia believes it can do that. If not for his continuous pursuit of a bigger, better deal, Todd Grantham would still be the Bulldogs’ defensive coordinator. But Grantham’s greed and disloyalty could turn out to be Georgia’s good fortune. Coach Mark Richt replaced him with Jeremy Pruitt, who coordinated FSU’s top-10 defense last season and was a defensive staff member of the last three BCS championship teams.
Under Grantham, Georgia often looked unorganized as it frantically scrambled to make calls before each play. And breakdowns in the back end of defense were all too common, helping contribute to five scores of 40 or more yards.
Pruitt’s primary focus with the Bulldogs has been to simplify the concepts. He plans to employ fewer schemes and have his charges be more fundamentally sound. It has worked for him before.
Limit gaffes: To that end, defensive breakdowns weren't the only thing that cost Georgia dearly a year ago. The Bulldogs also struggled in the areas of special teams, turnovers and penalties.
They ranked 13th in the SEC in turnover margin (minus-7) and 12th in times penalized (83) and led the league in the unofficial category of special-teams catastrophes (9). Georgia gave up a kickoff return for a touchdown, two blocked punts, a fake field-goal attempt for TD, muffed two punts, mishandled two punt snaps and one mishandled hold on a field-goal attempt.
All of these breakdowns would seem to fall in the general category of on-field discipline. Richt and his staff have made moves to address it. They’ve tweaked almost every facet of the daily practice routine and reorganized special-teams coaching responsibilities, placing the majority of the duty at the feet of assistants Mike Ekeler and John Lilly.
Avoid injury bug: Teams always will have to deal with injuries, but what happened to the Bulldogs last season bordered on the surreal.
Not only did they come in bunches for Georgia, they mostly came to front-line players at the skill positions. Malcolm Mitchell, Todd Gurley, Keith Marshall, Michael Bennett, Chris Conley, Justin Scott-Wesley and, finally, record-setting quarterback Aaron Murray all were sidelined for significant periods of time. Their absences contributed significantly in Georgia’s five losses.
The Bulldogs are off to a precarious start again as Mitchell aggravated his right-knee injury before stepping onto the field for Georgia’s first preseason practice. His outlook is not good for the opener against Clemson, but the prognosis is that he’ll get back in the game at some point this season. UGA can only hope it ends there.
