ATHENS — Mark Richt had his own way of keeping his Georgia football teams fire up after big wins.

“I would always try something to make them mad,” Richt said. “I thought players played better when they’re hot. I think coaches coach better when they’re pissed off, and so I would look for something to make them mad, and sometimes the other team helps you out by talking smack.”

There hasn’t been much trash talking leading up to Georgia’s game with Auburn at 3:30 p.m. on Saturday, but UGA coach Kirby Smart has his own ways of keeping his team fired up.

The most recent, a pregame speech before the Alabama game, was leaked and drew some public backlash from some who didn’t understand or appreciate the motivational technique — even the UGA players do.

“It’s like your favorite pregame song,” former Georgia offensive lineman Ben Cleveland once said when asked about Smart’s motivational talks. “It makes you want to put your helmet on and run through a brick wall.

“You get that every day at practice, you are bound to be successful.”

Richt said the pregame speech “sets the tone,” and “gets guys physically and mentally ready to play.”

“Your team has to know what they are doing, but they also need the emotion to play a physically challenging game,” Richt said. “It’s lore, and it’s a type of warfare, but it’s not life and death like our soldiers. But you do need emotion, it takes a lot of guts and it takes a lot of bravery to run into a guy full speed, and he’s running into you full speed, and no one is backing down.”

Richt recalled Jon Stinchcomb’s halftime speech in the 24-21 win over Auburn in 2002 that propelled UGA to its first SEC championship game appearance and win.

“Jon got on everyone, he called everyone out on the team, including himself,” Richt said. “So when he finished talking I pretty much added ‘what he said!’

Stinchcomb, notably, scored a touchdown when he recovered a fumble in the end zone in Georgia’s come-from-behind win.

Smart’s formula for success has certainly worked well for Georgia, as it was ranked No. 1 for the 40th time since 2021 — 23 times more than the next best team in that category, Ohio State, which has been ranked No. 1 on 17 occasions in that span.

UGA tailback Dwight Phillips Jr. said it’s typical for Smart to fire up his players before games.

“For the most part he’s always like that in the locker room,” Phillips said. “It fires you up and gets you ready to play.”

Dontrell Glover, who has an offensive lineman is engaged in brute contact every snap, was more blunt.

“Coach talking to us before the game,” he said. “gets us ready to go to war and go kill.”

Glover’s comments are metaphorical, of course, but the nature of the game requires a more violent mindset than perhaps any other because of the level of contact with players looking to impose their will against one another.

Hence, Smart’s pregame references to “Him or me,” which led ESPN analyst Rece Davis to conclude after the Bulldogs’ 20-17 win over Alabama, that “Georgia was Him.”

Richt said outside talk can also motivate a team, as he recalled former Auburn coaching legend — and Georgia graduate — Pat Dye saying publicly in 2002 that “I don’t believe Georgia’s man enough to beat Alabama.”

Dye, who passed away on June 1, 2020, would later tell the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that he said those words to motivate his alma mater, where he was a two-time All-American in 1959 and 1960.

“When Pat Dye, in 2002, said Georgia’s not man enough to beat Alabama, I mean that was perfect,” said Richt, whose 2002 Bulldogs beat the Crimson Tide 27-25 to score the program’s first win in history in Tuscaloosa (Alabama played their home games with UGA in Birmingham and Montgomery before then.)

“That (Dye comment) is all we talked about, was being man enough, every day, every practice, every rep.”

Smart typically challenges his players every day in practice over the loudspeakers, calling out subpar efforts or techniques with sharp, and sometimes humorous, critique and commentary.

Smart’s practice comments can be heard outside the gates of Georgia practices, but the head coach would prefer if pregame motivational talks stay in the locker room.

“I feel like that’s a spot that you should be able to feel safe to talk to your team and communicate with your team,” Smart said. “It (pregame speech leak) has happened before to us. We’ve got to do a better job managing it, honestly.”