ATHENS — Slowly but surely, Georgia is getting ready for its first game of the 2025 season.

The Bulldogs open the year against Marshall, with the game set for a 3:30 p.m. ET start in Sanford Stadium.

Georgia wrapped up fall camp this past week and has begun moving from focusing on itself to the visiting Thundering Herd.

Below is a full transcript of everything Kirby Smart had to say with Georgia less than two weeks from the start of its 2025 campaign.

Everything Kirby Smart said coming out of final Georgia football scrimmage

On takeaways from the second scrimmage...

“Yeah, I felt that the scrimmage was hot, and it affected our performance as opposed to the first scrimmage. In the history of those scrimmages, it usually goes scrimmage one, struggle, scrimmage two, we get better. This was more of a scrimmage one with 70 degrees, it was really fast, it was really competitive, it was a really good scrimmage one, and then scrimmage two was similar to past scrimmage twos where we had some sloppiness, guys got tired, water in the shoes, just it was hot. 

“So they did push through. They had a really good camp. We practiced Thursday, Friday, really hard leading into Saturday. So we didn’t expect to have high speeds in terms of the guys running. That wasn’t the purpose. The purpose was to get game-like situations, tackle live. We achieved those purposes, and we came out pretty unscathed injury-wise, which is big when you tackle. So we still got a ways to go, didn’t have as much success defensively in the second scrimmage as we did in the first, but we had bright spots individually, probably on both sides of the ball.”

On if he wants to name Gunner starting QB...

“Yeah, so y’all can write about it? No, I don’t.”

On what you expect to see from him...

“Good decisions, good decisions. Make good decisions, continue to develop, understanding situational football. We’ve made football so complicated. Some quarterbacks, I don’t think they know that down-and-distance. I don’t think they actually know, do I have another down after this play, or is this my last chance to get the first down? It’s just little things, being a quarterback, understanding the game, understanding what the defense is doing. He’s grown so much in regards to that.

“ID in protection, the ID in run game. Playing quarterback is, it’s like being a computer. He’s got a million things going on at once. And he’s gotten better and better at handling those things, and that’s what I want to see him do when he gets the opportunity.”

On receiving group as a whole, but specifically Noah Thomas and Zachariah Branch...

“Yeah, the receiver group does some really good things at times. It’s been hot at some practices, which creates, it makes it tough catching situations when you’re in the wet world of sweat everywhere. So it makes it really hard to be functional sometimes when it gets like that. But when we’re inside playing fast, more game speed type things, not the mental toughness stuff, they’ve done a really good job.

“We have some depth at those positions. We’re trying to put those guys in key positions on special teams, which in the last couple of years, I feel like we’ve had eight, nine guys at wide receiver that contribute and play special teams. This year, I’m hoping that’s 10, 11, and that difference of two is a lot on special teams.”

On Kris Jones’ position switch…

“Well, he helps us because he has length. He has the ability to play on tackles. We multi-purpose those guys. There’s not an outside linebacker that hasn’t been here that we don’t ask to stack, fall over the top, play goes away, you become an inside backer, play to you. You gotta be able to play on offensive tackles and set edges. And he’s able to do both those things. He’s grown a lot at that position, continues to grow. He’s a kid that we want to be able to develop as both inside linebacker, outside linebacker. He does some packages on third down that allow him to play stack back and rush from standing up, things he’s done in the past. So it really just, it helps our team. He’s got the ability to be versatile.”

On the competition level between the o-line and d-line...

“Yeah, I think any physical camp, training camp,those guys get to be closer than anybody else because they’re constantly on top of each other, hitting each other, and play in, play out, challenging each other whether it’s pass rush or running the ball, or conversional pass play-action. They get after each other a lot. 

“Both groups respect each other and go about it the right way.I think that’s the tone that each O-line and D-line coaches — those guys in those rooms, we have to protect each other in there, but we’ve also got to make each other better. That’s a fine line between how you play the game from a safety standpoint and a violence standpoint to getting better versus taking care of each other. And both groups have done a really good job to be in camp of challenging each other.”

On Gabe Harris and his role on this defense...

“What stood out as far as what he did fall camp? He did what he was supposed to do.He’s executing probably at a higher rate than he did this time last year.He didn’t go through spring practice, so we’ve had to balance what is the right number of reps to get him in shape and get him better but not wear him down as a 265-, 270-pound guy that he’s having to fill some big shoes that have played here in the past between Ty Igram, Mykel, and those guys. It’s a role that he’s serviced, and he’s done a nice job doing what we ask.”

On what this week looks like and if Georgia is in game prep yet...

“Yeah, we take this week and continue to work at us and get better for us.The staff has offseason work they’ve done on opponents as well as our opening opponents. But today, tomorrow, and really the rest of the week is focused on what did we need to improve on coming out of the scrimmage? What situations have we not hit? How do we get the bottom of our roster caught up to the top? How do we get healthy? Just what do we need defensively, offensively, and special teams? And some of those are set things we need that we have to check off. Other ones are we haven’t been quite as good at this.We need to improve it this camp.”

On Georgia’s penalty situation during camp...

“You know, it’s hit or miss.I mean, we’ve had days we’ve had more of this than that and some days less of this than that. We do a penalty report every day. We go over it with the players.We coach them on that. We show them clips of past calls that would have been called,wouldn’t have been called in that same scenario. And we have a long kind of encyclopedia or library of clips and calls and games and try to show them ones similar to the ones they got so they can learn from them.”

On how Georgia simulates the fast-paced decisions that Gunner Stockton will face in a game and if some of it just has to be experienced in game... 

“No, we simulate it in practice.That’s what we do.That’s why we practice, right? So you simulate it for a quarterback. It’s not any different between practice and a game.We’re not hitting him.So it’s one of those things that you get lots of reps at it.

“But there’s a decision that he has to make every play.It’s not a play that he takes that he doesn’t have to at least decide something because that’s what offense has evolved to.You don’t want to be in a bad play, so the best way to put a bad play is to give people options.The more options you give them, the tougher it is, and the more tough it is, the more you get second-guessed. So that’s what we do.”

On what he’s seen from London Humphreys and what his role can be...

“Yeah, London has been great. He’s a high-quality special teams player, has become very reliable, made some huge plays for us last year in the Clemson game, the Tennessee game. He does a lot of really good things for us. He has consistency in performance, he has dependability, he’s got fire passion and energy. We’re very fortunate to have someone of his character, quality, speed, athleticism, so we’ve got a lot of expectations for him.” 

On how important it is to have a big, physical running back with what they want to do this year...

“Yeah, a running back’s a running back. I don’t, you guys’ job is to say the size of the back. I don’t, Derrick Henry’s a big back. He’s big, but he bounces out a lot and outruns people to the edge, and that’s the way he was when he played. I’ve seen really small guys like Daijun get inside really hard yards and be 190 pounds. I don’t try to put guys in categories, let them be who they are. If you’re going to be a big back and not be super elusive, then you better be physical and run that way. But the identity of the back is based on the back.  don’t think that proves itself out except for in scrimmages and games when the things are tackle.” 

On potential playoff expansion and conference championship games...

“Yeah, I’m probably like most people, the majority of them, I would love to be able to expand the playoffs if it’s done the right way in terms of giving more teams opportunity. I think that’s what fan bases want. People are not excited about a mid-tier bowl game in some of these programs they’re at. I think those bowl games are great experiences. I played in them, I’ve coached in them, I love them, that’s an opportunity. But the more teams you give an opportunity to decide things on the field, like you do, whether it’s college basketball, high school football, old 1-AA football back when they had the playoff. I mean, you’re going to get things decided on the grass. So yeah, I’d be for that. You say, well, what about the championship games? I love the championship games. Can you have your cake and eat it too? Can you move the season up, start it, get it done? If you can’t and you can only have one of those two, I don’t know which one I would pick because it would probably depend on the format.” 

On where Justin Williams has grown the most...

“Probably physically. He came in very intelligent mentally, very instinctive, very bright-eyed, and loves football. He’s got every part of the fire, passion, and energy we want. He’s gotten a little heavier, came in a little bit lighter. He’s gotten a little bit heavier. He’s able to take on things. He understands the defense better.  He’s improving as a tackler. That’s one of the areas that he really targets is getting better at, and he knows he has to work on that to be an effective player. But I’m very pleased with where he is. I was very pleased with where he was last year in terms of coming in and doing what he needed to do.”

On the middle 8 against Notre Dame...

“Nightmare.”

On how they account for and prepare for the middle 8... 

“Yeah, since I came to Georgia, Mel Tucker was on our staff. We talked about it. It was a big NFL thing at that time. I don’t think we had the two minute warning per se, which everything was two minute. It just wasn’t a two minute warning.

“We’ve kept the stat since we’ve been here every year, and we show it every Monday, who won the middle eight. And the middle eight is, it’s not any more important now than it was then.We talk about it, we talked about it for a long time. And we’ve won it in a lot of games, but we’ve lost it in some games. But it’s crazy, the statistics between one year, we talked about turnovers.Well, that’s the greatest indicator of who wins. The next year, it’s explosive plays. That’s the greatest indicator of what determines who wins games, is who has more explosive plays.Both of those are huge indicators. And then there’s the belief that the middle eight is the greatest indicator of who wins games. And statistically, you can go year to year, and it’s just very thin margins between the difference in who wins games over those three factors. So middle eight, you could say it’s just as critical as those. You’re trying to double possession people. It’s why a lot of people defer, and to get a double possession.

“It’s a lot of strategy in it. There’s a lot more people going forward on fourth down,closer to half to keep somebody from getting an extra possession. But we look at it, we study it, we try to attack it the right way.We historically have been really good at that. And probably the worst we’ve ever been at it was the Notre Dame. We’ve never been outscored that much in that period without touching the ball.”

On if there’s a difference in this fall camp with the blue caps being implemented... 

“Not really. The temperature is the biggest difference in this camp.The first, I don’t know exactly how many practices, I would say 9, 10, or 11. It was really cool, uniquely cool, and then back to normal. That’s been the most different thing about the camp.There hasn’t been a huge difference in terms of what we do.” 

On the cornerback position battle... 

“I think both players have got tremendously better. I think Donte Williams’s done a really good job with all the corners.But those guys, Demello, has gotten better and made more plays and tackled well. Dom (Kelly), Jonate (Gilbert) as young players, both getting better. Daylen (Everette) has probably a little bit lightened rep load in terms of multiple positions, learning different things, but still playing.And he didn’t get to go  through spring, so it made it where, okay, he had to get back to competing and challenging and doing things. But those guys have done a tremendous job, and both of the two you mentioned have gotten better throughout the year.” 

On Georgia’s tackling ability... 

“Yeah, we’re not the tackling team we need to be.I can tell you that from the last scrimmage. The only way to get better at it is to practice it. So what do we do? We practice it, but we try to practice it in safe ways.When you tackle to the ground 11 on 11, the statistics indicate it’s your highest injury rate. So every coach in the country is torn between possibly losing the starter versus missing tackles in opening games. So we do the best job we can to simulate it.Our defensive staff spends countless hours on leverage, pursuit, tackling, but nobody’s perfect at it.”

On Drew Miller and Brett Thorson... 

“Yeah, I thought Drew had his best scrimmage since being here. His last scrimmage, he hit really good hang time, distances, and field zones. I think it was five or six in his field zones, hit some really good pooches.Brett is kicking. He did not kick in the scrimmage. He kicked at the scrimmage, just not live in the rush periods.So he’s improving, he’s getting better. I don’t know if he would say he’s 100% yet. I can’t answer the question whether he’s gonna go in the first game or not.We’re gonna see where he is, see how he’s doing. And where he and Drew compete to find out, because Drew’s playing really well. At least in the second scrimmage, he played better than the first.”