Wake up, ‘Dawgs. We’re saving daylight.
The clocks may be turned backward but the college football season rolls forward, as the Bulldogs begin preparations to travel to Oxford to take on the Ole Miss Rebels.
Georgia opens as a slim 2.5 point favorite on the road, indicating the Dawgs are probably still less than a touchdown favorite to the folks in Vegas even on a neutral field.
Part of that I expect is watching the Stormin’ Kiffins put 63 points on the board against an overwhelmed Arkansas this past week. Jaxson Dart passed Dr. Bo Wallace to become Ole Miss’s all-time total offense leader, and the finely tuned effort has Rebel fans thinking a victory over Georgia and a trip to the College Football Playoff may still be within reach.
We’re still not exactly sure about Trevor Etienne’s status for this weekend after he went down early in the Florida game. But Jordan Hill at Dawgs247 notes that running backs coach Josh Crawford got pretty solid production out of the rest of his unit, which may bode well for the future.
Something that didn’t bode well for Georgia was another sloppy effort from Carson Beck. As Coach Smart noted after the game, he simply has to do a better job of throwing the ball away and living to fight another day. And as Connor Riley notes this morning over at the AJC, Smart isn’t about to bench his veteran starter.
And he’s right not to. I get the frustration. But I’ve seen enough of Gunner Stockton in his action at Georgia and Jaden Rashada when he started at Arizona State in 2023 to know that Beck is still the best quarterback on this roster. We don’t need a different guy under center. We need the current guy to improve his performance and decision making by about 5%. Right now Carson Beck is making 2-4 terrible decisions across 35 passing attempts in each game. It’s easier to clean that up, even late in the year, than it is to break in a new starter in the midst of a playoff run. Anyone who tells you otherwise is frankly just letting their emotions get the better of them. Until later….
Go ‘Dawgs!!!