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Steve Spurrier dominated Georgia during his career as a head coach.

Steve Spurrier talks about wrecking Georgia’s title chances in 2007

Cy Brown
Cy Brown

Welcome to your one-stop shop for UGA football news and takes every Monday through Friday. In this edition, we look at Georgia’s biggest storyline of August, an updated timeline for an in-state 5-star offensive lineman and Steve Spurrier talks about his lifelong dominance of Georgia.

As always, Steve Spurrier is hatin’ on Georgia

If you don’t want to read Steve Spurrier crowing about his dominance of the Georgia Bulldogs, go ahead and scroll past this section.

SB Nation released a ton of posts on Wednesday celebrating the 10-year anniversary of the 2007 college football season, which was the best —and craziest — season ever. You can read posts about Appalachian State’s upset of Michigan, the legacy of the Wildcat offense and Louisiana-Monroe beating Alabama in the first year of the Nick Saban era, among others.

As a Georgia fan, you might believe the Bulldogs were cheated out of a chance at the BCS championship. Georgia was ranked fourth at the end of the season, and many folks thought the Dawgs would leap to second in the polls after West Virginia and Missouri fell in the final week of the season. But Georgia only tied for the SEC East title with Tennessee. And since the Vols beat the Dawgs that season, they went to the SEC Championship Game. From there, LSU beat Tennessee, and its 11-2 record trumped Georgia’s 10-2, giving the Tigers a spot in the title game. We know how that ended.

Which brings us back to Spurrier. One of Georgia’s two losses that season was a 16-12 upset by South Carolina in Week 2. That game was one of two reasons Georgia didn’t make it to the SEC Championship Game and didn’t get a chance to play LSU for a spot in the BCS title game.

So, as part of SB Nation’s huge retrospective on the 2007 season, Spurrier himself received a byline on a post, as told by Steven Godfrey. After going over that game, Spurrier went in-depth on a career spent rent-free inside the heads of Georgia fans.

“To tell you the truth, I’m proud of the fact I have more wins over Georgia than any other coach in history. I think I got 16, but hey, we’ve lost seven. I’ve coached against them 23 times.

At Florida [from 1990 to 2001], we had better players than they did just about every game. We went 11-1 with them.

So, maybe psychologically after a while, it may have helped against them, because we did beat them five times when I was there [at South Carolina]. But you treat ’em all about the same, every game. We ended up 5-6; I was 5-6 against [Mark Richt] at South Carolina. We didn’t really have their number. But at one time, we’d beaten them four out of five years, so hey, I guess that’s pretty neat.”

As a Georgia fan, you’ve just got to love to hate Spurrier, and know the feeling is mutual.

Fifth year’s a charm?

SB Nation’s big 2007 project did illuminate a pattern Georgia’s repeated over the last 15 years: Every five years, the Bulldogs come close to the national title.

In 2002, Georgia finished the regular season 11-1 but missed the title game because of undefeated seasons from Ohio State and Miami. The 2007 season was undone by the insanity above. And, of course, the Bulldogs came up a few yards short of winning the SEC Championship Game, which would’ve set up a date with an extremely beatable Notre Dame team in the 2012 national title game.

By my math, it’s been five years since 2012. So, if you’re the superstitious type, go ahead and get your hopes up.

5-star prospect Jamaree Salyer has a new timeline

Jamaree Salyer, the 5-star Pace Academy (Atlanta) offensive guard who long has been predicted to land in Athens, has a new timeline for his college decision. In an interview with Jeff Sentell of DawgNation, Salyer said he hopes to make his call during the inaugural early signing period this December.

“I hope to do it, or better than that, I feel like there is a really strong chance I can do it in the early signing period in December,” Salyer said. “By that time, I will have my mind made up and will just want to end it. I feel that because that last month in that late signing period now, it can get really tough and really wear down on your family. I can see it even starting to take a toll on my mom a little it. I’m just looking forward to making my decision and hopefully, it is the right one.”

Georgia’s biggest storyline of August

ESPN looked at the biggest August storyline for each team in its preseason top 25. Writer Alex Scarborough said the biggest story for the No. 13 Georgia Bulldogs is the progression of Jacob Eason.

“Like a lot of teams in the SEC, the Bulldogs’ playoff hopes are likely to hinge on a young, second-year starting quarterback’s development. Quarterback Jacob Eason flashed a cannon for an arm and a penchant for big plays as a true freshman, but consistency was an issue. If he can find that [and a couple of playmakers at receiver], Georgia’s offense could be dangerous.”

Former Dawg is top seed in 200 IM final at World Championships

The 17th FINA World Championships continued Wednesday in Budapest, Hungary, and it was yet another good day for a former Georgia Bulldogs swimmer. Chase Kalisz set a personal best in the 200-meter individual medley, finishing in 1 minute, 55.88 seconds in the semifinal to advance to the final Thursday as the top-seeded competitor. It was the second time in the same day that Kalisz recorded a personal best, as his semifinal run broke the 1:56.48 he swam in the prelims.

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Good dog

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water.

NEXT Georgia mailbag: The questionable notion that the Bulldogs are one year away

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