That was more like it.
Facing their first ranked opponent of the 2023 season, Kirby Smart’s Dawgs finally got off to the sort of fast start that had eluded them in earlier games. And they didn’t let up, either, romping to a 51-13 win over the Kentucky Wildcats.
After five games of doing just enough — and in a couple of cases having to come from behind — it was good to see the sort of absolutely dominating performance we got used to over the past two seasons.
Certainly, the way Georgia demolished a previously unbeaten SEC opponent in such an overwhelming fashion ought to shut up those folks who’ve been saying the Dawgs didn’t look like a No. 1 team.
Kentucky head coach Mark Stoops said after the game that Georgia “beat us in every area. It is hard to come up with an opening statement after a beatdown like that. It has been a while. It doesn’t feel good.”
Well, it felt very good on the other sideline. As UGA running back Kendall Milton put it: “We kind of showed who we are. A lot of people doubted us. …. Every year we lose a lot of people, whether it’s to the draft or portal. A lot of people question us. And I feel like we answered a lot of questions tonight.”
On a perfect fall evening, playing before a capacity Sanford Stadium crowd that Smart described as “electric,” the Bulldogs were led by red-hot quarterback Carson Beck, who opened the game with a baker’s dozen completions in a row, threw some very catchable balls and finished the first half with an incredible 307 yards and 3 touchdowns.
Beck only played three quarters, but wound up going 28-for-35 for 389 yards, 4 TDs and 1 interception. He is the first Georgia QB since Aaron Murray in 2013 to have three straight games of 300-plus passing yards.
Brock Vandagriff finished up the game at QB for Georgia and led the Dawgs to another score.
Smart summed up Beck’s performance succinctly in his post-game interview with D.J. Shockley of the Bulldogs radio network. Georgia’s starting QB, the coach said, “had such great composure. When he’s hot and is in the zone, he can dial it up.”
The Bulldogs racked up a season-high 608 yards of offense on 73 plays, the program’s first 600-plus-yard showing since Missouri in 2020 (615). In the first half alone, Georgia had 384 yards on 38 plays, scoring on its first six possessions.
A dozen Bulldogs caught passes Saturday night, led by All-American tight end Brock Bowers, who snagged 7 for 132 yards and 1 TD. He should have had another, as the Athens crowd witnessed the rare sight of No. 19 dropping a sure touchdown in the end zone on one drive.
Bowers now has 2,369 career receiving yards, which moves him to sixth in school history. Also, he has 24 career TD receptions, which ranks second. And he had his 10th career game of 100-plus yards receiving, including his third straight.
It wasn’t all Bowers, though. Georgia’s receivers generally had a superb night, with Marcus Rosemy-Jacksaint quickly becoming a major downfield threat, catching 4 passes for 99 yards and a touchdown. Transfer Rara Thomas caught 5 passes for 63 yards, including a wow-inducing TD catch on which he went up high over a defender to catch the ball and then, twisting as he fell, somehow managed to get a foot in bounds.
Meanwhile, Kentucky came into the game riding a prodigious running game, but a week after Cats tailback Ray Davis ran through the Gators for 280 yards and 4 touchdowns, he was held to just 59 yards on 15 carries by the Dawgs. His only score came on a pass reception.
In all, UK finished with 183 yards of offense on 50 plays and was just 2-for-11 on third-down conversions.
However, even then Smart complained that “we actually didn’t play great defensively in the first half,” despite Georgia’s halftime lead of 34-7.
And it’s true that Kentucky derailed itself a couple of times with stupid penalties. On the other hand, one of the Wildcats’ scoring drives was enabled by the flag-happy officiating crew with a couple of calls against the Dawgs, one of which (roughing the passer) was bogus.
Actually, Georgia’s best defense Saturday night proved to be its offense. By jumping out to an early three-touchdown lead, Smart pointed out, the Dawgs took the Cats out of the sort of time-consuming ground game they like to play. (In fact, it was Georgia that had the biggest clock-eating drive on a run-dominated series in the second half that ate up more than 7 minutes).
Playing from behind, Kentucky was forced to throw a lot more, and that’s an area in which Cats QB Devin Leary is not particularly proficient. (The Dawgs also notched 3 sacks during the game.)
Again, the key was the Georgia offense starting the game on fire. “Our players started fast, finally, and that was great,” Smart said “We challenged them all week to have a connected physicality. We really wanted to be connected because we felt like we could be more physical if we were together. We talked all week about mass and acceleration equal force. We wanted to have a lot of mass and a lot of acceleration.”
Yeah, that was Georgia’s head football coach (who was a business major) invoking a law of physics. It was that kind of week.
While the Dawgs’ defense still might not have played up to the standard Smart is expecting, they kept Davis and the Cats’ running attack under control most of the time. The key to that, Smart said, was “striking blockers. We took our kids after the Auburn game and showed them about 20 plays where we struck blockers, played blocks, knocked people back, played good run defense and I said, ‘you have it in you, we have the ability to do it and here’s what we did right and here’s what we did wrong.’ They bought into that. We tried to show a lot of confidence in them and knew that people were calling them out a little bit about the run defense and they answered the bell.”
Conversely, against a Kentucky run defense that had been one of the best in the country, Georgia’s depleted running back corps looked like it’s slowly getting better, as the Dawgs rushed for 173 yards and a 5.6 yards-per-play average. UGA became the first team to gain 100-plus rushing yards against a UK defense that, coming into Athens, ranked 8th nationally, allowing just 2.54 yards/rush and 9th nationally at 75.8 yards per game.
Daijun Edwards led Bulldog runners with 54 yards on 9 carries while Kendall Milton finally is starting to look healthy, and had 47 yards on 8 carries, including a 5-yard TD. Both made some tough runs where they kept on going after the first and even second hits.
One of the factors in Georgia’s running game was the offensive line. While their pass protection was excellent throughout, the run blocking was only so-so in the first half, but improved in the second half, when Georgia decided to keep it on the ground more.
As for special teams, Georgia only had to punt once all night, but freshman placekicker Peyton Woodring seems to have shed his early-season yips, making field goals of 32, 36 and a career-long 42-yards. He also was 6-for-6 on PATs for a season-high 15 points. His three field goals made was a season-high, too. Return man Mekhi Mews also had a 69-yard punt return, but it was negated by a flag for an illegal block.
It was the first game this season in which Georgia has played four really good quarters, and you could see the Dawgs enjoying themselves. Heck, at one point in the fourth quarter, mascot Uga XI, aka Boom, was seen in the midst of the team, soaking up some love from the players.
So, the Dawgs extended their overall winning streak to 23 games. In addition, it was Georgia’s 33rd straight regular-season win, 22nd straight SEC regular-season win, and it was the team’s 23rd win in a row on Dooley Field. They have won 39 of their past 40 games. And, it was UGA’s 14th in a row over Kentucky.
Oh, and for those who care about such things, Georgia, which had been favored in Vegas by 14.5 points, finally covered the spread. And then some.
It was a good night for the Dawgs, but they’re only halfway through the season. I liked how linebacker Jamon Dumas-Johnson summed it up when asked whether this was a statement win. “I don’t think a statement is made in one night,” he answered. “We have to keep progressing. We have to keep going.”
