ATHENS – Kirby Smart and Lane Kiffin know each other quite well. The two worked together at Alabama as the offensive coordinator and the defensive coordinator during the 2014 and 2015 seasons.

Saturday will be the first time the two face off as head coaches. Kiffin brings the No. 10 Ole Miss Rebels into Athens to take on the unbeaten Georgia Bulldogs.

Smart had plenty to say about Kiffin, among other areas of interest heading into Saturday’s game.

Below is a full transcript of what Smart had to say. Saturday’s game is set for a 7 p.m. ET start.

Opening statement...

“Before we jump to Ole Miss, I want to talk about some accolades and some things going on in the athletic department to make sure we get great coverage for our other teams. Basketball is getting ready to start. But the women’s soccer team, which I got to watch the semifinal match and parts of the final match, won the SEC Tournament. I want to congratulate Keidane and his staff. What a tremendous job. He has made a major impact on our soccer program really quickly. They will be, hopefully, hosting a Friday match here in Athens, which should come out today. But I also want to encourage everybody to come out for basketball. We both have home-openers this week. I think the women open tonight, is that right, Claude? 7 p.m. against North Carolina A&T here at home. The men play Friday night at 7 also against Wake Forest. With the excitement of our game, we should get a great turnout for both the basketball teams, as well as the women’s soccer. So I encourage you guys to help promote that and get folks out for that.

Moving to Ole Miss, they’ve got a really good football team. They’ve improved. When you watch them on tape and you watch the games throughout the year, they’ve improved with every game. They’ve played a tremendous schedule, and some really tough teams they’ve played on their schedule. Lane does a great job with his program, with his team. They have a great staff. They have really good players. He’s done an incredible job. The quarterback’s playing at a high level. Great backs. I think Pete on defense has brought unbelievable energy. You see it the way they play and the way they attack the ball. They come after the ball. They lead the SEC in, I’m pretty sure, turnover margin. But I know they have the fewest fumbles and the most fumbles gotten. They do a great job of that. They attack that, and they play really hard. We’ve got a hell of a challenge. We’ve got a great atmosphere. We need it to be as great an atmosphere in Sanford Stadium as it’s ever been to help take care of our home field advantage that we need to have. So, looking forward to that, looking forward to the preparation time. That starts today.”

On answers when teams blitz you and what Ole Miss has done to pressure the QB...

“Well first off, Pete’s always been that way. His aggressive nature. He comes after people. They’ve got the players to do it. They’ve got a really good team speed on defense. They will come after you with different looks, multiple looks, and try to confuse the quarterback and the offense. That’s what good defenses do. He’s been around good defenses his whole career. He does a great job defensively. I’m sure they’ll have a plan. They study what you do, and they study what you’ve seen, and give you problems. He’ll have forms of that. They do a good job with that. Your answers to pressure and blitz is protection can beat pressure if you protect well. There’s other answers. We all know what they are. You’ve just got to be able to execute them. We pressure people with our defense. They’ll come after you, and they’ve done a good job with that, being disruptive.”

On how he’ll remember this senior class and Xavier Truss possibly getting emotional Saturday...

“Well, I hugged him last year, so ... It’s gotten to be the norm of, you know, guys — especially with the COVID class — that have multiple years. It’s a little confusing who’s a senior anymore. It’s hard to go by that, but I’m certainly very appreciative for what all they’ve contributed because it’s not really one class. It’s fifth-years, fourth-years, sometimes third-year and fourth-year redshirts, things like that. It gets confusing who’s in a class.

But this class has been great. This group of leaders has been very impactful. I think it speaks for itself what they’ve been able to accomplish thus far, and they still have goals ahead they want to achieve.”

On Jamon Dumas-Johnson’s injury and if Xavian Sorey will be back...

“Yeah, we’re expecting to have Sorey back as well Raylen, CJ, Smael, Jalon, Terrell. All those guys will be competing at those spots. As far as Pop, still not sure how long it’ll be, how long his absence will be. He’s going to try to find some innovative ways to get back and be able to play, but won’t know the extent of that until a couple more days. Really excited to see those other guys get opportunities. We’ve got other guys that have played, and thank goodness at linebacker we use that as a normal rotating position. We have guys that roll in and play. We’ve averaging playing four guys at that position each and every game.”

On having a night game on Saturday and if it contributes to the atmosphere in Sanford...

“I don’t know. I don’t know that the night game impacts it. I mean, I think the 3:30′s have been great, you know? So I think the toughest is the 12 o’clock kick to get the atmosphere you want, but I don’t know that I see a difference between the other two.”

On CJ and Raylen’s progression this year and how tough it is for younger ILBs to learn the communication piece...

“Well, go back. They both were here midyear, so they were — we do so many walk-throughs and so many practices and so many in between. They’re both very intelligent kids, they pick up on things really well. They’re both very conscientious. They’ve both played more and more. Raylen more recently, CJ throughout the whole year. Very pleased where they are.

They’re in a room where they’re asked to learn a lot of information and be able to command the defense, and they do a good job of that. I’ve got a lot of confidence in those two guys.”

On Ole Miss quarterback Jaxson Dart...

“Well, I think Lane’s quarterbacks take on a personality from him. They have a lot of moxie. They have a lot of talent. They play really hard. They play with reckless abandon for their body. He runs like a running back. He’s taken some hits this year and shone his toughness, so he’s not going to shy away from contact and toughness and the extra element of run that gives them a competitive advantage over a lot of teams you play. They have great backs, but he runs the ball like a back. He throws the ball really well, too, which that’s what makes them really hard to defend when you’ve got a guy that can make all the throws but can also take off and run. He’s proven the ability to do that.”

On clarification on if Dumas-Johnson had a fractured forearm...

“Uh, I’d rather not speculate, to be honest with you. Just say what we said earlier.”

On Quinshon Judkins….”Thick lowers. I tell you, I’ve been super impressed. I already knew about Quinshon and how good he was. I saw him last year and how they ran on people. Bentley kid’s incredible too. They’ve got two really good backs. Quinshon bears probably more of that load. He has really thick lowers. He runs through tackles. Extremely patient runner. He has an innate ability to navigate what’s there and turn it into explosives and positive runs. He just sets up blockers really well. Really tough, physical runner, does a great job. They have two really capable, talented backs.”

On Brock Bowers’ rehab process…”He’s been great. He’s done everything we’ve asked. He ran on Friday, did a good workout. Had Saturday off, obviously, and continues to work. He’s going to do all he can to try to get back as fast as he can.”On defending Ole Miss receiver Tre Harris…”Hard. You can’t, it’s hard to put two people on him because of all the issues we just talked about before that. You talk about the backs, you talk about the quarterback. They look for matchups, Lane looks for matchups. He’s looking for every opportunity he can to get a high percentage matchup in his favor. It’s easier to do when you’ve got big, good wideouts and a quarterback that can get them the ball and you have the ability to run the ball. He does those things. How do you do it? You do it like you do every week. You do your best to cover him and defend him. You try to control the run game. It’s the package of what they do, everything together, not one thing, that complements each other.”

On Lane Kiffin and his relationship with him and if he’s under appreciated…”He does a great job. He’s extremely intelligent. He doesn’t overthink things. He keeps it simple and doesn’t think that you, you don’t have to overthink things sometimes as a coach. Probably doesn’t get enough credit for that because he wants to beat you with fundamentals. He wants to beat you with his players doing things within their system. It’s just, he does a great job. He looks for matchups, he looks for explosive opportunities. They’re one of the most explosive offenses, run and pass, in really the last 10 years of the SEC. They have broken some numbers that are out there. They get lots of snaps because they go with pace. They do a good job with the snaps they get. No, he probably doesn’t get enough credit, but it’s not like he’s trying to be scheme of the week. He does what he does really well. He knows what they do well and he also knows what you don’t do well. He’s looking for a matchup most of the game.”

On Kamari at STAR...

“If you remember, we talked about how he played that position as a freshman and he played that position in spring practice and he plays that position when we go out and do reps against the offense. It’s something that we don’t ever veer really far away from. He didn’t learn it in three days. He didn’t go out there never having played it. There are concepts in a meeting room that don’t revolve around your position. We go do drill circuits all offseason and say, ‘This is how you play this. It doesn’t matter what position you play, you have to be able to play this.’ He did those things. He’s very bright, very conscientious. He didn’t learn to play it within a week. That wouldn’t be realistic. He only had to do so many things, and he’s done those things in walk throughs and was able to execute them in the game.”

On how much a win over Lane Kiffin would mean...

“Not any more than it would’ve last week. We’re not going to build it up to be something it’s not. Every win in the SEC is critical. It’s critical for them. They’re in the hunt. They’re in the hunt for the West, they’re in the hunt for the Playoffs, they’re in the hunt for all the goals and aspirations they have. It’s not about he and I, it’s about the players and the guys that go on the field and make plays.”

On Tykee putting the team before himself...

“He’s unselfish. He understands his role on the team. He’s been a really good special teams player for us. People don’t give him enough credit. He’s been elite at kickoff return. The job he has is one of the hardest jobs. He’s been really great on punt return, kickoff, he’ll play on punt if we ask him to. He plays the nickel/STAR position really well. He does what’s asked, and he has an appreciation for his role and what he does because he didn’t have that role last year. And you have a greater appreciation when you don’t have it and get an opportunity to earn it and keep it and do it. He’s appreciated that more this year.”

On innovative ways to get back, expounding on that...

“Not really.”

On Smael Mondon, calling the defense...

“He’s already a vocal leader. He does a great job. He calls the defenses when Pop’s not in there anyway, and when Pop is in there, they share. That’s not a big concern. To be honest with you, the two freshmen, they don’t practice and play like freshmen. They know the calls and do a great job. I think Smael will do an awesome job of calling stuff.”

On Amarius Mims...

“Mims practiced all of last week, did a good job, wasn’t quite 100% but he took reps at his right tackle position and did a good job. Truss took reps at right and left tackle which he continues to do and probably will still continue to do so this week. That’s not going to change in terms of those reps. I think Mims is much closer, he feels comfortable. He probably could have played Saturday had we needed him. I think he’s in a good place. I think he’s much closer to being able to play and play like he wants to play and go out there and compete. Looking forward to seeing him do that in practice so we can gain some more information.”

How the offensive line graded out...

“I mean, what’s a grade? I’m very happy with the result. They played hard. Could we have played better? Yes, 100 percent. I mean, it always go back to the same thing on the offensive line. You play against different teams and sometimes you get your butt whooped. There were times Saturday we got our butt whooped. I think our guys would be the first to admit that. The goal moving forward is to not let that happen again. There were times we won and times we lost. You want to win them all. The expectation for our team is that you’re going to win every play up front and that’s just not real in the SEC. You’re going to face really good defenses and really good people. You’ve got to keep chopping wood. Keep coming back and we did that. We found ways to have success in the run game. We had a couple of really nice runs by Kendall and Daijun.”

On if he had a dog growing up...

“I had a lot of bird dogs growing up. I had to go feed them all the time. Didn’t enjoy that but that’s one of my childhood memories is taking it out there in the cold weather to feed the dogs. We have a dog now, Bess, that my wife loves to death. But we don’t bring her around the team so she doesn’t get to hang out around the team like Juice does.”

On the crowd...

“Yeah the Tennessee game is the most impactful since I’ve been here. I feel like they impacted the game the most. Can you tell? I feel like our crowd is really good for all of our games. I don’t know if you separated it in ratings, I don’t know where it fits. I definitely think it was very impactful against Tennessee and I think we need that same impact for this game in terms of the way they go about things an how you can affect the game.”

On the defensive backs being more flexible...

“We may have more depth. I don’t know that we have more... There’s no more possibilities than we didn’t have before. I feel good about the DBs we have now, I feel good about the DBs we had before, I don’t really know what you’re asking. We had a package last week but that was not something about our DBs that was something they did.”

On Julian Humphrey...

“We got other guys that can play. We got other guys that are on the sideline that can play too. He gets an opportunity to play because he’s earned it in practice. I have confidence in 5 or 6 guys that can go out there and play because I get to watch them do it in practice everyday. I’ve got confidence in some DTs that don’t play. I’ve got a lot confidence in 2 or 3 linebackers that are on the scout team that got everyday. I’ve got a lot of confidence in a lot of our players that can go out there and play.

But you play the players that give you the best opportunity to win. You can’t play everybody. You don’t get a chance to do that. You can’t even rep and prepare everybody. We’re constantly developing all of our players so they have the opportunity to go out and have success when they get in the game.”