If any Georgia football game so far this season could be called a feel-good day, it was Saturday’s 56-7 win over Charleston Southern.
It was a clear and somewhat chilly Senior Day in Athens, with all fourth-year or better players honored in a pregame ceremony (even some who might well return for a pandemic-exception bonus season next year).
One of the departing seniors was defensive lineman, giant human being, longshot Heisman candidate, all-round good citizen and Bulldog Nation folk hero Jordan Davis, who decided to forgo the NFL this year to come back and play another season for the Dawgs. As a thank-you from the coaching staff, Davis, a finalist for both the Outland and Bronko Nagurski trophies, got to score a touchdown when inserted on offense for a couple of plays as a running back. Afterward, he was pounded on the helmet and back-slapped by his ecstatic teammates.
Said starting quarterback Stetson Bennett, who handed the ball off to Davis: “My whole job on that play was just to make sure he gets the ball, make sure he had the right hand up and just let him get in the end zone. It was pretty cool. Whenever we shifted out, and everybody saw what was going to happen, and the stadium went crazy, I was like ‘Just get him the ball. Just make sure he doesn’t fumble the ball. Get him the ball.’ Hopefully, nobody took a picture right when I was handing the ball off, because I’d look pretty small.”
Asked by DJ Shockley of the Bulldogs radio network what his reaction was to Davis’ TD, head coach Kirby Smart said, “I felt good to see him getting up after it.”
Among the other high points of the day, the No. 1-ranked, 11-0 Dawgs tied a school record for the most points scored in the first half, racing out to a 49-0 lead at the break.
The home crowd also got its last chance of the season to cheer in person the amazing feats of freshman tight end Brock Bowers, a speedy big man who runs over people and has proved to be one of the biggest success stories for the 2021 Bulldogs. He led the team with four catches for 36 yards and caught 2 more touchdown passes, giving him 8 so far this year, setting a Bulldog record for TD catches in a season by a tight end.
More good news was that two long-absent Georgia receivers rehabbing from knee surgery, Dominick Blaylock and George Pickens, dressed out, and Blaylock actually got into the game for the first time in two years, playing on special teams and catching 2 passes for 11 yards.
Also, those UGA fans who believe a game is not complete without former starter JT Daniels getting to play quarterback got to see that happen for about a quarter — as he was the second of four different signal-callers in the game for the Dawgs, following Bennett and ahead of Carson Beck and Brock Vandagriff.
And, for run-the-damn-ball fans, Georgia’s rushing attack scored 4 touchdowns (including Davis’ 1-yard plunge) and outrushed CS 233 yards to 68. Zamir White led Georgia rushers with 4 carries for 83 yards (with an astounding average of 20.8 yards per run), while James Cook ran the ball 6 times for 59 yards. Both had 40-yard runs and both scored touchdowns. Kenny McIntosh ran 4 times for 31 yards, and Daijun Edwards had 6 carries for 21 yards and a TD.
Georgia outpassed the Bucs 255 yards to 58, with 4 more touchdowns, though there also were two interceptions thrown (one by Bennett and the other by Beck).
Frankly, none of Georgia’s QBs had a stellar day, though Bennett, Daniels and Beck all had their moments. Bennett, who played a little over a quarter, completed 8 of 14 passes, with 1 interception on a tipped ball and 2 touchdowns. Daniels was 7 of 12 for 73 yards and 1 TD, and Beck completed 5 of 10, with 1 interception and 1 touchdown. Vandagriff missed on his only pass attempt.
The Dawgs’ nation-leading defense was its usual awesome self. The Buccaneers converted on only 4 of 20 third-down attempts (something Smart mentioned with pride after the game), and CS was forced to punt the ball 12 times. Georgia had 5 sacks and 8 tackles for loss.
To date this season, opponents have scored just 83 points, and that 11-game tally is the lowest since 1950, when UGA allowed 65.
On special teams, Jake Camarda had 5 punts for a 48.4 average, Jack Podlesny made all 8 of his PATs and Kearis Jackson had a season-long 41-yard punt return and finished with four returns for 79 yards. Ladd McConkey returned 2 punts for 62 yards, with a long of 34 yards.
Pleased that his starters had played up to “the standard” early on, Smart emptied the benches, letting those hard-working scout teamers and walk-ons who normally toil in anonymity get into the game.
For the day, Georgia’s 8 touchdowns were scored by seven different players, 11 different runners carried the ball, and 12 different Bulldogs caught passes.
The Dawgs, still battling a stomach bug that hit the team before last week’s win over Tennessee, apparently came out of the game without any major injuries. A couple of banged-up defensive starters, Christopher Smith and Nolan Smith, didn’t play, and offensive lineman Jamaree Salyer also sat out the game, though Smart said he could have played, if needed.
The only downsides to the day were some ineffectual play by the offensive subs in a snooze-worthy second half, and Georgia losing the chance for another shutout on a bizarre play that saw a Dawgs defender intercept a tipped Buccaneer pass in the third quarter, only to have a Charleston Southern player grab the ball away from him and run 65 yards for the visitors’ only touchdown.
Let’s face it, had Smart done like some coaches would have, and kept his starters in the game longer, the score against the outmanned Bucs undoubtedly would have been even more lopsided than it was. But, Georgia’s head coach didn’t just take his foot off the gas in the second half; he turned off the ignition and coasted downhill.
It didn’t make for a particularly entertaining third or fourth quarter — with the Georgia subs and the Buccaneers basically playing to a 7-7 draw after intermission — but it allowed a bunch of Dawgs most of us never have heard of to have their moment playing Between the Hedges.
Smart praised those hard-working walk-ons after the game, and Bennett, a former walk-on himself, added: “They do everything that the entire team does. They get beat up on special teams. But they’re there when we have a 5:30 a.m. run. … To let them go out there and have success in front of 90,000 people, that’s the coolest part of games like today.”
Getting those players into the game, Smart told Shockley, “meant a lot to me.”
Frankly, though, much of the second half was boring, even for die-hard Dawgs fans. Once you get past third-string, the talent/experience level drops off considerably.
Thus, you had a drive where Beck completed a nice 26-yard pass to freshman wide receiver Jackson Meeks, and then Edwards broke some tackles to make it first-and-goal at the Charleston Southern 1-yard line. However, the run-blocking from that point on was not very good, and the Dawgs failed to score in four tries, with a rather poor fourth-down pass by Beck intercepted in the end zone.
Charleston Southern, which is a member of the FCS Big South Conference, tried to spice things up a bit with some trick plays that looked like something drawn up by kids in a sandlot game, but the Bucs aren’t very good, so the plays didn’t work.
The stadium started out fairly full, but quickly began emptying early in the fourth quarter. The game was televised, but not over the air or on traditional cable/satellite. Every team in the SEC gets one game per season streamed on ESPN+/SEC Network+. This was Georgia’s.
Still, overall, it was the kind of day where fans leave the stadium with a smile on their faces.
And, while it was Senior Day, the real star of the game was big No. 99; the images that most of Bulldog Nation will retain from this win are of Davis carrying the ball, and then getting a well-deserved honor after the game.
The nose guard, who frequently spends time posing for pictures with Dawgs-loving youngsters, closed out his Sanford Stadium career by climbing up on the stepladder and conducting the Redcoats during their post-game performance. He also was given a plaque and uniform, making him an honorary member of the band.
“I thought I would maybe go over there and conduct and call it a day,” Davis said later. “But the moment when they made me an honorary member and gave me a coat was special. It makes me feel great, because they love me as much as I love them. I wish they had more recognition, I wish they had more love from Dawg Nation.”
I do, too.
