If Hutson Mason were judged solely as a quarterback making his second college start, he wasn’t bad.
He threw for 320 yards. He brought his team back with a fourth-quarter touchdown pass and had Georgia in position to win a bowl game. He missed some throws and took some sacks, but he also had several passes dropped, including inside the 10-yard line with 25 seconds left.
The problem, of course, is that Mason is going to be measured against a high bar, set by his predecessor, Aaron Murray.
Georgia’s season ended Wednesday with a 24-19 loss to Nebraska in the gloom, gray and rain of the Gator Bowl. It left the Bulldogs with a pedestrian record of 8-5 and a furlong out of the Top 25 rankings, a significant drop from those lofty early-season aspirations of SEC and national titles.
There were several reasons for the miserable ending. Todd Grantham’s defense found a way to cave on a third-and-14 from the Nebraska 1-yard line, resulting in a 99-yard touchdown pass when two defensive backs didn’t do what they were supposed to do. (Go figure.) Think of the Auburn game, only with fewer ramifications and no stupid bounce.
There were two Georgia turnovers that led to short fields for Nebraska touchdowns and four dropped passes in the Dogs’ last two (scoreless) possessions.
But even with all of that, the Dogs probably win this game with Murray at quarterback.
The offense had six red-zone possessions. Only one concluded with a touchdown. The others resulted in three field goals and two fourth-down incomplete passes. This is the Georgia team that ranked among SEC leaders with 45 touchdowns in 67 red-zone trips (67 percent), mostly with Murray.
The 1-for-6 showing wasn’t stunning. As offensive coordinator Mike Bobo said afterward, “No matter how much you watch from the sideline, it’s different when you get onto the field. Hopefully these two-and-a-half games will alleviate some of the growing pains he’ll go through next year as a first-year starter.”
Mason’s trial by fire as Murray’s replacement in 2014 started when the senior suffered a torn knee ligament in the next-to-last regular-season game against Kentucky in. He obviously is not where he needs to be next season for Georgia to make a run, but nobody should’ve expected that he would be.
The rain and wet conditions “bothered him a little bit,” Bobo said. Officials were slow to dry off footballs. “But eventually we got Hutson calmed down a little bit,” he said.
Mason appeared to get more comfortable as the game went on, although he never said there was a problem. To the contrary, “I felt great the whole game. The first couple of drives we converted some big third downs. So I didn’t really feel like I came out slow or anything. I wasn’t perfect, but I feel like we were doing great things moving the ball down the field.”
But the difference was noticeable early. Murray, who started 52 games, often checked into and out of plays at the line, but Mason seldom did. Bobo said Georgia intentionally kept things simple.
“They (Nebraska) didn’t do a lot coverage-wise that we were going to check out of,” he said. “But that said, you don’t want to give a new guy so much that he isn’t going to be comfortable playing. You just want him to go out and play.
“When the rain stopped and there was no wind in the third quarter, he was able to get his confidence back a little bit. But when you don’t have a good grip on the ball and (the defense is) playing tight coverage, you have to trust yourself, and he was a little tentative. He’s an instinctive player, but there was a little bit of him not pulling the trigger. Trust your guys to go makes plays. Trust it and ripped it.”
With Georgia trailing 24-19, coach Mark Richt decided to pass on a 32-yard field-goal attempt with just under five minutes remaining to go for it on fourth-and-2 from the Nebraska 14. Rantavious Wooten dropped a first-down pass.
The Dogs got the ball back and drove to the Cornhuskers’ 16 (easy field-goal range that potentially could’ve put them ahead had they kicked the previous drive). But in a similar situation, fourth-and-3, Mason’s pass was dropped by tight end Arthur Lynch inside the 10.
Lynch, who played his final college game, later praised Lynch and went as far to say,”There’s no reason for Hutson to not match the single-season numbers that Murray was putting up.”
Mason didn’t quite guarantee as much, but confidence isn’t an issue.
“I had a chance to get two games under my belt against quality opponents, and that’s huge going into next season,” he said. “I believe the guys believe in me and going into the offseason, knowing I’m in charge.”
They were the correct words, but they would’ve had more impact after a win against a beatable opponent. We’ll learn more next season.
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