ATHENS — For the last time this season, Georgia will go on the road in hopes of picking up an SEC win.
Georgia takes on Mississippi State, cowbells and all, this Saturday as the Bulldogs look to keep their playoff and SEC Championship hopes alive.
Georgia coach Kirby Smart spoke to the media for nearly 20 minutes on Monday to cover a number of topics.
Below is the full transcript from Smart’s news conference.
Kirby Smart shares his thoughts on Mississippi State
Opening statement...
“Another week in the SEC as we all know. Really good opponent in Mississippi State. Jeff, I know well, and good guy and done a great job with their program. The energy, enthusiasm coming out of that program, you can see it in the way their kids play. They’ve got no quit in them. These guys have competed. They’ve been in every game they’ve played. They have upgraded the talent level since he’s been there. You look at the group he’s put together defensively, offensively and special teams. They’ve got really good players all over the field. Our guys are going to be up for a great challenge this week. We’re going to their place, and when you go on the road in the SEC, trust me, I’ve played a lot of years and coached a lot of games at this place. It’s a tough place to play. They have a great fan base, and Jeff and his staff and done an incredible job. So we’re looking to start getting ready for these guys.”
On Jordan Hall, Chris Cole and Demello Jones...
“Jordan will be out for some time. Not sure how long, but he’ll be out for some time. Chris Cole, we have a chance to get back this week. We think he’s gonna be able to play and be able to go. He might be a little limited today, but he’ll be able to practice tomorrow. Demello, surprisingly, is better than we originally thought. He’s got some soreness in the elbow, but he may be able to play, so we’re excited that news isn’t as significant as we thought. But Jordan is a tough one because that kid’s been through a lot injury-wise. He fought to get back last year towards the end of the year, and he wasn’t even 100 percent healthy then. Then he had a good offseason and was really leading and competing and playing well for us. Just a tough injury for him to sustain. We’ll see what the timeline is once we know more later today and tomorrow.”
On Blake Shapen...
“He’s a good fit. He’s got great arm talent, great vision, quick release, which is critical in their offense. He can spin it. He understands their system. He knows where to go with the ball with the decisions he makes in terms of running, throwing, box counts. He’s very experienced at it, a talented player. He’s got great legs. And they’ve got another quarterback that is a really good player, as well.”
On Anthony Evans and Brenan Thompson...
“Yeah, Anthony’s played awesome. It was great the last 24 hours. I’ve seen highlights throughout the year, watching Anthony play really well just in games in passing and things that overlapped. And then yesterday, you get to sit and watch four or five games in a row. He’s really played well. Explosive, fast, vertical threat, quick game threat, blocking well. He’s always been a good returner. He’s everything we’ve thought he was. He’s really grown, gotten better and as you grow up and get better, you improve, and he’s done that at a really high level.”
“And obviously, Brendan Thompson’s a force to be reckoned with. I mean, this is the fastest guy I’ve seen on tape probably in multiple years. I can’t remember the last time I saw somebody this explosively fast and dynamic as this guy is. So the package of those two guys together is really good.”
On Mississippi State getting over the hump...
“Well, No. 1, it shows hard work pays off. They’ve continued to work hard. They’ve stayed true to themselves. They’ve, all you gotta do is watch the tape. They’ve been in every game. They’ve had several games they should’ve won, could’ve won, but didn’t. Obviously it didn’t slow them down because, even Arkansas, Arkansas every game they’ve been in. They score a ton of points. They’re a hard team to beat. A lot of respect for the coaching staff and their team shows you what kind of competitive character they’ve got that they’ve sustained that in every game regardless of the outcome of the games.”
On similarities to Tennessee’s offensive system...
“It’s the same, but different.”
On Noah Thomas’s growth...
“I think early on it was the system in terms of spring practice. He’s grown physically. I think Coley’s done a really good job using his skill set and making sure he understands development at the next level becomes more than just being a receiver with the ball in your hands. Whether that’s what you do without, in terms of blocking, what you do in special teams, how you’re an asset to your teammates. He’s been incredible at all those things. He has wanted to start on our special teams units all along, and he really has in punt return until last week. We took him off because of the number of snaps he was having to play. But he’s been one of our best leaders in terms of enthusiasm and energy on the field.”
On Mississippi State secondary that leads conference in interceptions...
“They get after it. They’re very disruptive. They confuse you with different packages. They have some different looks they use. They have some long length. I haven’t seen this kind of length in a long time at corner and safety, in terms of length allows you to tip balls, knock balls down, intercept balls. They are very lengthy and can get balls down and create havoc through what they do. They’ve done a really job this year creating those turnovers. They’re plus in the margin. Anytime you’re plus in the margin in our league, that’s winning because it’s a really competitive league in terms of turnovers.”
On determining hit rate among transfers...
“I don’t know that we determine a hit rate. I look at these as kids, human beings, student-athletes. I think our sell to them was come be part of our family and our culture and grow and enjoy in the success that you might have, but enjoy in the success of others. They’ve all hit on that. It’s a big part of what I believe to be the culture when you go into the portal. You have to have people that are shaped the right way mentally and strong enough that hopefully they can contribute to your team both on the field and in the locker room.”
On Chauncey Bowens’s health and usage rate...
“No, Chauncey’s healthy. He’s done a great job when he’s had the opportunity, and his number’s been called. That injury was significant whatever game it was, Auburn maybe, can’t remember what game it was. But outside of that, he’s been pretty healthy and done everything we ask and continues to improve.”
On Kamario Taylor at quarterback...
“No, we don’t have anybody to simulate that. He’s big, talented, athletic. They use a package of him with Blake in the game at the same time, which creates its own issues. Then they use him in situations. They used him some when they’ve had backs out. They’ve used him, not necessarily as a back, but he is an addition to the run game that throws the ball really well. So he’s a very bright talent, and he’s a good football player. I don’t know that you can simulate it. You do the best job you can, and you prepare.”
On Josh Brooks’ role as athletic director...
“Well, look, Josh does an incredible job for us as a football program, but his benefit goes way beyond football. He’s an athletic administrator that cares about this place. He wants to be great in all athletics. He cares about all the sports. It’s not just football. I mean, yeah, every AD wants football to be successful because that funds your athletic department. He makes no qualms about that. We need to be successful in the age of revenue sports. But his job is to support every athletic endeavor we have here at UGA, and he does that every year. He has an incredible staff. Darrice [Griffin], I saw today and the people that he has on his staff have done a tremendous job. I think Josh knows the support you get here from administration, team effort, it’s a team concept, that he wants to be part of that. I’m glad he does.”
On Zion Branch’s performance...
“Well, I don’t know. It depends on this week of practice and every week of practice, right? KJ right now is our starter. KJ’s a good football player. We’re trying to get better play, as a whole, out of our entire team. That starts with front, linebacker, secondary, receivers, O-line, all of them. So we’re going to go out to practice today and try to continue to get better. I was very pleased with Zion stepping up. We put a lot of pressure on him every day in practice to go out there and execute. He doesn’t take the same number of reps as KJ, but he takes a lot of reps, so there’s days he goes out there and works really hard. All that hard work paid off, telling him to go out there and play and help us be successful.”
On Nnamdi Ogboko’s role...
“Nnamdi did a good job. He plays. He’s gonna probably play a little bit more of a role now. He continues to get better. I spent a lot of time with Nnamdi down on the scout D when I run the scout defense, and he is a guy that is similar to Christen was his sophomore year. Christen Miller went down there with us. Jordan went down there with us. We’ve had a laundry list of guys who’ve gone down there, and what we say, go against the best of our O-line. A lot of times their growth explodes. They get better faster than the guys that maybe aren’t doing that. I’ve seen that with Nnamdi. He’s gotten better and better and better at striking blocks. Big emphasis for him from a conditioning level standpoint. He takes a lot of pride in getting that right so he can be on the field for more snaps. He was a big boost the other night because he’s very good at block recognition. He understands leverage, and he strikes and gets off blocks.”
On comfort level with this team in close games...
“I don’t ever feel uncomfortable in a game based on the score. I’m uncomfortable in how we play sometimes. It’s not about the fourth quarter, the first quarter, the halftime. It’s not about the score because we really don’t make it about that. When you want to dominate someone, you don’t look and check and see what the score is halfway through. The objective is to dominate them. There’s no scoreboard when you’re talking about dominating somebody. You look at it end of the day and see if you did. We haven’t done that very often in terms of dominating the way we want to, but we’ll continue to try to.”
On noon games, cowbells and trap games...
“Noise is noise. It’s hard to play in the SEC on the road. I have not been to an SEC venue that it was not hard to play into on the road. It’s just hard. That’s not going to change with them. They’ve got a really vertical stadium. I think the noise gets trapped in their stadium. It’s one of the loudest places I’ve coached, and I’ve coached there a lot. They’ve got a lot of pride in how they play and how their team plays and the support of their team. So I mean, as far as the early kickoff, that’s more unique to me than the stadium. When you go to the road games, it’s road games and it’s hard. The uniqueness is the change in time, time zone a little bit because you’re changing time zones and what time the kick is. Unless they don’t have to show up until earlier or later, it’s the same for both. It’s how you manage it. We approach it differently, take a lot of ideas from other people on the best way to manage it, but sometimes you make a bigger deal out of it than it is. You’ve just gotta go play.”
On Charles Winslette to Georgia high school football...
“Charles Winslette is a great man. He is, I don’t think there’s a coach in the state of Georgia that doesn’t have a story about Charles Winslette or a classic story. He’s a very, very interesting man. He has done it for a long time. He’s done it successfully at a lot of places. He’s very bright. He’s a Georgia grad, played baseball here and was a good friend of my father who everybody knows passed away. I always appreciated their relationship as a young kid in South Georgia. Winslette was coaching there. They used to trade film and trade stories, so for me, I go way back with Winslette.”
On low sack-rate and turnover-rate...
“We’ve been that way before. We have never been a sack machine, if you look at us statistically. We’ve never been a turnover machine. We have been better defensively than we are right now, but a lot of that has to do with the culture of the league, what we’re playing in, the parity. I’ll take the strengths we have, work with them, try to work on the weaknesses, try to worry about the process and not the results.”
On Joseph Jonah-Ajonye...
“He’s really been beat up this year. He’s been dealing with several injuries this year, and I think he’s pushed through really hard. I’m excited that he gets to speak with you guys because he’s such a high-character, high-caring individual who has such a great story. His mom is one of the sweetest, nicest ladies I’ve ever met who basically has brought her children to this country and raised her children here, and she has worked her way to success. Now he’s working his way to success. He’s one of the toughest kids we’ve got. He pushes through injuries. I thought he had one of the big plays in the game the other night. He was a main part of the fourth-and-1 stop, in terms of his effort and his get-off. We need him to keep improving. We’re not used to having to lean on true sophomores, but he’s a guy that has some natural pass-rush ability and natural ability that we need to capitalize on.”
On Landon Roldan carving out a role...
“Yeah, I’ll be honest with you, all those young wideouts continue to grow. I thought both he and CJ Wiley had really good off-week practices in build-up to Florida. Talyn’s coming back from his injury, getting better and running now. Tyler Williams is doing a great job. Blackshear. When you look across the board, that’s a great class and they continue to work. I’m excited today to see those guys continue to work. I’m trying to challenge them that next-man-up. Somebody’s gotta be ready, and you don’t get ready when the injury happens. You get ready when you’re prepping for it, and they’ve done a good job doing that.”
