The game will be remembered for the drama.
And the comeback.
And the comeback that followed the comeback that happened when a quarterback known for his running chucked the ball about a mile into the air and it deflected off a defender’s hand and into the arms of his receiver, who scored with only 25 seconds left. (This can’t truly be confirmed without several weeks of processing, and possibly candles and incense.)
But somehow it seemed appropriate that Georgia lost a football game Saturday because its defense gave up a big play.
The Bulldogs lost to Auburn 43-38 (and I needed to look at the scoreboard three times for confirmation). It was a remarkable game with a remarkable ending, one that deserves to be remembered with others in history, from the “Hail Flutie” game between Boston College and Miami in 1984 to last year’s SEC Championship game between Georgia and Alabama.
Georgia trailed 10-0 after the first quarter, 27-10 at halftime and 37-17 after an Auburn field goal with 12:39 left. The seventh-ranked Tigers and their fans prematurely celebrated a seeming lopsided win over a Georgia team that had body-slammed them on this same field a year ago 38-0.
The Dogs’ defense looked like it had for almost every game this season. Disjointed, discombobulated, dismembered.
Then, the bizarreness bomb went off.
Mark Richt’s short summary later: “Well, it was a very interesting ballgame.”
Somebody get that man a thesaurus.
Auburn, which had 566 yards in offense and seven scoring drives on its first nine possessions — another field-goal try was blocked — went three-and-out on consecutive possessions. It was a wonder that Georgia defensive coordinator Todd Grantham didn’t ask for a raise on the spot.
Georgia quarterback Aaron Murray — who was playing his last real SEC game of the career, because nobody really counts Kentucky — threw consecutive touchdown passes to Rantavious Wooten and Arthur Lynch.
Suddenly, it was 37-31 with 5:59 left.
Relatively speaking, that was like a pregame stretch.
Georgia got the ball back with 4:47 left at their 45. In six plays, Murray moved them down to the 7. After three consecutive incomplete passes, Murray must have thought, “I’ll do it myself.” And he did. He scrambled up the middle for a go-ahead touchdown, barely making it across the goal line.
The touchdown required several reviews. Also oxygen for everybody watching.
This is where the story should end.
Storyline: Murray, the senior quarterback who came back for moments like this, wins the game with 1:49 left.
But it still wasn’t over. With this defense, it never is. The final play may seem like a fluke. But when a defense allows 38, 30, 41, 31, 41, 31 and 43 points in seven of 10 games — and the other games came against North Texas, Appalachian State and offensively challenged Florida — is anything really a fluke?
Nick Marshall and Auburn got the ball back one final time with 1:45 left. With 36 seconds left, the Tigers faced a fourth-and-18 from their own 27. It should’ve been over. It wasn’t.
Marshall, kicked out of Georgia in 2012 for his role in a dormitory theft, heaved the ball downfield toward receiver Ricardo Louis. Georgia had two safeties there, Josh Harvey-Clemons and Tray Matthews, but neither did the right thing (grab the ball or knock it away). The ball bounced off Harvey-Clemons’ hands, up in the air, and then fell perfectly to Louis inside the Georgia 15. Louis turned and ran into the end zone. There were 25 seconds left when he gave Auburn the lead.
Murray tried for one last improbable score, but the drive fizzled at the Auburn 20 as time expired.
Back to defense. Grantham can be thankful it took this long to mention his name again.
This game should be viewed as referendum on the Bulldogs’ defensive coordinator. His defense has underachieved all season, just as a year ago with all of that NFL talent, just as a year before that.
Auburn has one of the better offenses in the nation. So it’s not as if the Dogs are the first that Marshall and the Tigers have made look silly. But 323 yards rushing, 243 yards passing and 29 first downs isn’t excusable on any level.
Georgia is now 6-4. It hasn’t lost this many regular-season games since going 6-6 (pre-Liberty Bowl loss to Central Florida) in 2010.
There were high expectations. Georgia envisioned itself as SEC and BCS title contenders. A lot of things got in the way of that. Injuries hit like the Andromeda Strain. There was the home loss to Missouri and the unraveling at Vanderbilt.
But defense has been at the core of this team’s problems this season.
The greatest of comebacks by the offense and Murray nonetheless resulted in a defeat. It’s not often we see a team trail by 20 points in the fourth quarter but rally to take the lead with 1:49 left. It’s even less often that team then loses on a Hail Mary.
But somehow, it seemed appropriate.
