ATHENS — Georgia got off to a great start to the 2025 season, besting Marshall 45-7 this past Saturday.
Georgia coach Kirby Smart has already moved on to the next game, as the Bulldogs take on Austin Peay this weekend. The Governors pulled a Week 1 upset over Middle Tennessee State.
Below is everything Smart said prior to the Austin Peay game. Kickoff is set for a 3:30 p.m. ET start on ESPN+.
Everything Kirby Smart said as Georgia football moves on to Week 2
Opening statement
“I’m excited to get ready for Austin Peay, another home game, another home opportunity for our team. A lot of respect for this team. They played a good Middle Tennessee team and jumped on them and played really well, done a great job with their program. Been through some injuries last year that probably hurt them, but they’ve got a good group coming in to play us. Our guys had a really good practice yesterday. I thought we had good energy, enthusiasm. Made some corrections, and then worked on us and worked a little bit on Austin Peay as well. So, looking forward to this week.”
On how the offensive line played against Marshall...
“I thought we did some good things in the run game. We had some play-action pass mishaps between them, the backs, and coordinating some calls. But pleased to have guys that stepped up and played. We were able to play a lot of players in the offensive line, both out of necessity, but also out of getting a lead. So it was really good to get a lot of experience for guys to go in and play the game. Didn’t think we had great stamina in terms of being able to play long drives and stay fresh. It was a little bit warm out there, but it’s predicted to be even warmer this week. So, we’ve got to do a really good job of being the best conditioned team, and that’s important.”
On if parity and mobile quarterbacks will lead to teams going for it on fourth down more often…
“I don’t know that there’s a correlation between offenses going for it more often because of mobile quarterbacks. I don’t see a correlation there. I think people are going for it more on fourth down based on analytics. I don’t think it’s a matter of who the quarterback is. I mean, there’s been athletic quarterbacks for a long time in college football. What does the link between parity and mobile quarterbacks have? I don’t know what you’re suggesting when you say there’s more parity, so there’s more athletic quarterbacks.”
That could mean more teams taking advantage of all four downs in close games...
“If that was the case, then you would think there’s a lot more scoring, right? I agree with you. More people are going for it on fourth. But why, it doesn’t seem like scoring was up, at least in week one. If anything, it was down. So maybe those going for it didn’t work. Maybe they’re not happening at the same success rate. I think defenses are going to adapt to the analytics, and people are going for it more often, and they’re playing you differently in those situations than maybe they have in the past. But there probably is more parity, and there’s definitely people going for it more often.”
On how Daniel Harris and Ellis Robinson played against Marshall…
“Well, we talked a long time about process over results. That’s probably the message that goes to every position group. Not them, not directed at them, but did they do the process right? Were their eyes in the right spot? Did they play with the correct leverage? Did they play the right technique? There were a lot of those things we didn’t do right. The results were fine, right? But they didn’t do the process right, and we’re really trying to hone in on not results. It doesn’t matter how it came out. It matters, did you go about it the right way? We didn’t do that a lot in a lot of positions in terms of process.”
On Juan Gaston, Earnest Greene, and Daylen Everette’s injuries...
“Daylen Everette is dealing with an ankle injury, and seems to be doing well. He was able to run and do some things yesterday, and should be able to crank it back up today and do more. Juan and EG, we’re hopeful to get both those guys back this week, but only time will tell.”
On how Ellis Robinson has developed over the past year...
“Well, he’s improved his stamina first and foremost. He can finish practices and get through practice and keep up with the pace of the practice is really high. So his ability to maintain that, compete and run with receivers play after play, and play in fastball circumstances, he’s done a good job doing that. He’s always been very talented at covering people. There’s so much more that goes into playing defensive back and playing corner specifically than just being able to cover people in terms of zones, checks, eyes, motions, adjustments. He has bought into that. He said, you know what, that’s important. That’s what’s keeping me off the field, and I want to work on that. So his communication, his understanding of the defense has been really good. Tackling and physicality is always important at corner, and he’s not a guy that’s afraid of it. He has to play big on blocks a lot of times, but he’s not afraid of contact.”
On what stands out to him about Austin Peay’s defense...
“Twitchy, quick, disruptive, keep you off balance. Their defensive coordinator was at Tennessee Tech last year, he does a great job. They have guys that run to the ball really well, disruptive inside. They understand their job and their gap. It’s not as simple as just walking out there and saying, okay, well, you’ve got bigger and supposedly better players than these guys, just go run all over them. It’s not that simple. These guys are disruptive in what they do. They’re tied together. They play really hard. I always tell everybody, effort counts twice. If you play with great effort, it’s worth double the value.”
On if QB recruits have gotten more athletic and how hard it is to stop true dual threat QBs...
Yeah, I mean, it’s to the degree of what you’re calling them two-dimensional. I think there’s degrees, right? Think of the greatest running quarterback you’ve ever seen on a scale of one to ten, if that greatest running quarterback is a ten, where is he on the throwing element? The ability to be a great thrower and a pocket passer. Those two are not mutually exclusive, but for the most part, when you’re good at one, you don’t get a lot of work at the other, because you spend some of your time doing both. And I think looking across high school football, our game feeds up from them, just like we feed up to the pros.
“And the pro teams we’ve talked to in offseason and everything else, our game is creeping up to them. The high school game creeps up to us. And what do you see across high school football? You see more and more athletic QBs, guys that, shoot, I always say 20 years ago, 30 years ago, some of those guys might have been tailbacks. Not because they should have been, but that’s just what the football was. And now they’ve got the ball in their hand every play, and they can make throws, not make throws, Josh Allen or any of these guys you can mention, that they can also take off and run and hurt you and beat you in the pocket. So, I mean, I think we’re seeing that evolution, but I think it’s just more what high school is feeding to us in terms of the guys that are available and the guys that play well.”
On the progression of Dwight Phillips Jr...
“Well, his progression has been weight room, develop, grow, protect, protect the ball, get bigger, get stronger. He needed the weight room really bad when he got here. He’d never really been in a hardcore weightlifting off-season program. You remember, he didn’t get the spring before his freshman year, so his first true developmental off-season was to be here and lift and get after it. And he did those things. He still is a work in progress. He knows he has areas he has to improve on. But the great thing about Dwight, Peanut, is that he’s not afraid of the hard work. He embraces what his weaknesses are, and he’s trying to get better at those.”On the play of the Georgia safeties...
“Yeah, I thought those five guys that played back there did a nice job, continued to improve. They didn’t get tested probably as much as they get tested in practice. Like I told you guys, there’s a bunch of opportunities to get better, and one of them is today. And those guys will go out and compete and continue to develop and get better by the drills we put them in and the competition they have. But Saturday they did what they were supposed to do, didn’t get a lot of opportunity.”
On Roderick Robinson...
“Yeah, he’s dealing with a little bit of a hamstring, and he was gonna try to go Saturday if he could. And it was one of those deals that we didn’t want to press it once we got out ahead, and he’s continuing to rehab, get better, come off of his, he had an ankle surgery as well, and get comfortable with that.”
On Ryan Puglisi’s play against Marshall...
“Yeah, that’s what we’ve seen really in camp practices with him. He does a nice job in the pocket. He’s got really good arm talent. He understands the game. He’s taking more and more reps. I think the plays that we’re called with him in there, he’s very comfortable with, and he does a good job. When given the opportunity, we’re gonna continue to develop him and develop Ryan Montgomery as well, as well as the other two guys.”On the Georgia defense creating turnovers...
“Yeah, it’s critical. It’s really important. We just haven’t found a way to be dominant at it. I don’t know whether it affects us, whether teams protect the ball better against us, take less chances, or we just don’t get them out. It’s not something we don’t preach and sell and attack and try to do, but historically, at least since we’ve been here, we have not been elite at that. And it’s one of the things that popped out at us the other day defensively. We didn’t have as many opportunities with 55 plays, but we didn’t take advantage of the ones we had.”
On the next steps for Gunner Stockton...
“Next step is to continue to gain confidence in trusting his offensive line for play action, shot plays, two minute for the half. I thought he did an excellent job of improvising when things weren’t there or there was a breakdown. And that was probably the best thing he did was take care of the ball, protect the ball, and make plays with his legs. But he continues to get better. The next step is to play with a little more confidence. I think each time you start playing games, you lose some of that anxiety.”
On how they measure fire, passion and energy...
“No analytical system for that. It’s an inherent trait that some people have, some people don’t. But if they don’t have it, we try to expose it and bring it out, highlight it when they do. But there’s no statistical trait that we have to measure that.”
On Nate Frazier and Dwight Phillips Jr. and how their play opens up opportunities in the passing game...
“Yeah, I look at all our backs as really good. I mean, you mentioned Nate and Dwight, but I mean, Chauncey’s had a great camp. Bo didn’t get a chance to do a lot the other day, but Bo’s had a good camp. He’s practiced really hard. He’s done great. Rod has been there when he’s healthy, and then we’re hoping to get Josh involved.
“So depth at back is something you need. Those guys have to contribute on special teams. So if we’re able to be successful — and it’s not on the backs. Your running game is not completely dependent on your backs. It’s completely dependent on a lot of other things. But if we continue to do that, it’ll definitely complement the passing game."
On if anything can be done to incentivize better fan turnout at home games...
“Better incentivize? I don’t know that you incentivize the turnout. I don’t really believe in incentivizing things. I think it has to be a core DNA trait of belief, you know? When we sell things, it’s I will do this if you do this and incentivize. I don’t think that’s great motivation. I think it’s intrinsic in who you are. I think people should love to be at a Georgia home game because there’s only so many of them. It’s limited opportunities. It’s the same thing about our players. We don’t incentivize them to run to the ball by saying, ‘We’ll go up in your NIL if you run to the ball.’ You got to do it because you want to be great. You got to do it because you want to be different, and if our fans want be great and different then they’ll do it.”
On what areas he wants to see Georgia improve from Game 1 to Game 2...
“A lot of areas. It’s hard to pinpoint one. I talked about it in the beginning: process over results. So the process of playing your position efficiently and effectively, regardless of who is across from you, is what I want to see. So what improvement? The process over the result.”
On how big of a deal it is to lose a shutout in the fourth quarter...
“Yeah, I learned a long time ago. I’ve never been into stats here. Like, we don’t do that. We play more players when the game’s in hand than probably anybody in the country. I think of those opportunities as development opportunities. It’s why we’ve been really one of the better programs at turning players over in terms of what we put into the draft and lost early outs and having someone ready to go. I think that’s, number one, we develop and recruit. Number two, we practice our guys more as twos and threes. And number three, when they get an opportunity to go in the game — which we didn’t last year but in years past we have — we put them in the game. And if it costs us a shutout, then that’s a great lesson learned. I’d much rather that kid cost me a shutout in that game than him cost me a touchdown a year later in an SEC game. We just erred on that side."
On what needs to happen for Brett Thorson to return from injury...
“Yeah, that’s what we talked about last time. Like, he’s got to be cleared by the medical staff, and he’s close to being able to do that. But that’s a measure. It’s a hard measurement, you know what I mean? Like, I hope he doesn’t have to make a tackle, that’s the hope. But he does have to be cleared.”
On the club on Micah Morris’ hand and when that could be removed...
“I’m not sure of the timeline on that. He has the option of a hand cast with fingers out that he was not as comfortable with that he may be moving to. Kyron’s dealing with the same thing, but I can’t answer that. I don’t know when he’s going to be able to be out of the complete club.”
On more details on Juan Gaston and Earnest Greene’s injuries...
“Yeah, both of them lower-extremity injuries. Thanks.”
