The past seven seasons have produced unprecedented success for UGA football.
But what do you consider to be the Top 10 wins of the Kirby Smart era?
That’s a question I put to several of my Bulldog buddies this week as I pondered how I’d rank the Top 10 Georgia wins under Smart. I knew they’d enjoy the discussion, because one thing I discovered soon after I started writing the Blawg nearly 18 years ago was that Georgia fans love to make lists of greatest this or favorite that, especially during the long offseason.
When I started the process of compiling my Smart era Top 10 list, my initial thought was that the three playoff games and two national championship wins had to be the top five. However, where I ended up going back and forth was in the order that they’d be ranked.
From the start, I was pretty sure the national championship win over Alabama was going to be atop my list, and I found that my friends all ranked that game first, too, mainly because of the opponent.
As Scott Peacocke, one of my game-day texting buds, put it: “Absolutely has to be Bama. Got two giant gorillas off our back in one night,” referring to the 41 years since Georgia last had won a national championship and how it snapped a string of losses to Nick Saban’s Crimson Tide, going back to the 2007 overtime win in Tuscaloosa.
Yeah, it’s true that in the immediate aftermath of the total domination of TCU for a second straight national title, many Georgia fans were saying the 65-7 win was the greatest Dawgs game of all time. But, a few months later, looking at the big picture, the weakness of the Horned Frogs makes that game pale a little in comparison with the previous year’s win over Bama.
Because of that, second place on my list was in flux for a while. Joel Provano, also in my game-day texting group, said he’d put the win over TCU at No. 2, “just because it was a national championship game. And no one really expected it to be such a beatdown. They had beaten Meechigan, after all, even if it took some luck and bad calls to do it.”
Also, Joel said, “I just have a hard time ranking a playoff win over a second-straight title win,” though he conceded, “there’s a good case either way.”
And my brother Tim jokingly added: “I know you may think that the win over TCU was a cakewalk, but you have to remember TCU only made one mistake … getting off the bus!”
However, as Scott noted, the natty win over TCU “was almost embarrassing in its ease, and I’m not complaining about that at all — it was great to have no stress. But it was so lopsided against an outclassed foe that I wonder if it should be ranked lower than No. 2.”
In the end, I agreed with Scott.
For the No. 2 spot on my list, I narrowed it down to a decision between the 2018 Rose Bowl game against Oklahoma and the nailbiter win over Ohio State this past New Year’s Eve. At first, I leaned toward the Rose, since the Dawgs barely won the latter game when Ohio State missed a late field goal attempt.
Bulldogs broadcaster Jeff Dantzler agreed that both were “amazing games.” The win over Ohio State led to a natty, he noted, but he added that he thought it really was “a coin toss with the Rose.”
A couple of friends argued that the game against OSU should get preference, because it actually was a de facto national championship contest between the nation’s two best teams.
Owen Scott, whom I’ve known since kindergarten, at first was leaning toward the Rose Bowl game in the No. 2 spot, but then switched to the semifinal win over the Buckeyes. Like Owen, my initial thought was: If I’m picking the Top 10 games, do I rank a game we came within a missed kick of losing that highly?
But, when viewed in terms of it being a win over the second-best team in the country, as Scott said, I rethought that. It’s a fine line between picking “greatest” games and “favorite” games in rankings like this.
Darrell Huckaby also debated between those two games at No. 2. “I have the Rose Bowl and this year’s Peach Bowl 2A and 2B,” he said. “My kids and I go over and over and over it, and it’s hard to separate. Both put us in the title game. Both were come-from-behind wins, with different but equally exciting finishes. At the Rose Bowl, the feeling was ‘newer,’ so it gets the nod.”
But, as Owen summed up the Peach win over the Buckeyes: “The game was intense and competitive and it came down to one play with the championship on the line. That’s great in my book.”
I put the win over TCU in third place, the Rose in fourth, and then I went with the other playoff win, in the Orange Bowl over Michigan. Both that victory over a Big 10 behemoth and the game against OSU were “signature wins in establishing UGA as the dominant Division 1 football program,” Owen said.
Beyond the first five, my main debate with myself was over which game against Notre Dame to include on the list. At first, I was leaning toward the 2019 game in Athens, simply because it was one of the biggest “event” games I can remember. The entire city was crazy. They added temporary seating to Sanford Stadium to accommodate a record crowd of 93,246. Thousands of people who didn’t even have tickets streamed into Athens just to soak up the atmosphere, watching the game on TV as they tailgated.
However, Scott argued convincingly in favor of the 2017 game, “because it changed the trajectory of that special season. I remember on the flight up there my son and I were very pessimistic about our chances. True freshman [Jake] Fromm was making his first start, on the road no less, and we hadn’t looked great against App State in the opener.”
I briefly thought about including both Notre Dame games in my Top 10, but didn’t, because there were other games I just had to get in there.
One of those that I did include was this past season’s showdown in Athens between the two No. 1 teams, Georgia and Tennessee. Darrell said he found last year’s win against the Vols “so satisfying, because of the hype given Tennessee and intensity of the crowd.”
He also took the opportunity to put in a plug for the 2021 Clemson game in Charlotte, which, he said, “might have been the most intense — where you felt like the game could turn on any play — that I’ve been to.”
I ended up not including that Clemson game in my Top 10, though maybe it would be ranked 10B.
There were several other games that made it into friends’ Top 10 lists, but not into mine. One of those “honorable mention” contests was last year’s season-opening stomping of Oregon in Atlanta. Also, both Scott and Tim said they’d include the 2022 SEC title game win over LSU, but that one didn’t quite make my list.
Other honorable mentions: the 2018 win over Florida (52-7, the largest Georgia margin of victory in the series since 1968), the 2021 win over Florida (which helped get Dan Mullen fired, as Scott noted), the pandemic season Peach Bowl win over Cincinnati and the 2017 game in Neyland Stadium against Tennessee, a 41-0 Georgia victory that marked the first time since 1994 that the Vols had been shut out.
My grandnephew Gabe Rudd included the 2021 win over Arkansas on his list (at No. 5) because “the atmosphere was crazy, the hype for the game was crazy, due to both teams being Top 10, and then Georgia just completely waxed them, like they were a no-name school. But, overall, the atmosphere is what made that game as good as it was.”
And Scott threw in a wild-card choice, the 2016 Liberty Bowl win over TCU, because it was “the game that helped convince [Nick] Chubb, [Sony] Michel, et al. that Kirby was building something and the 2017 team could be special.” However, he added, “if I were to sub it, I’d probably go with a win over the Gators, agreeing with your 2017 choice.”
Overall, Owen said, it’s great that there are “so many to choose from!”
Added Darrell: “We are in the golden era of Georgia football, to be sure.”
So, here’s my Top 10 games of the Kirby Smart era:
1. Georgia 33-18 over Alabama in the 2021 National Championship Game. As Darrel said, “I think the win over Bama in Indy is forevermore No. 1. Oh, my word — the joy we experienced!”
2. Georgia 42-41 over Ohio State in the 2022 Peach Bowl College Football Playoff Semifinal. The Buckeyes had a 38-24 lead entering the fourth quarter, but Stetson Bennett did his thing, engineering two touchdown drives in the fourth quarter to give Georgia a 42-41 lead with just under a minute left. In the end, the Buckeyes missed a 50-yard field goal, giving the Dawgs their best comeback victory in the Smart era.
3. Georgia 65-7 over TCU in the 2022 National Championship Game. As TCU head coach Sonny Dykes could be seen saying on the sideline after yet another score by the Dawgs: “Wow.”
4. Georgia 54-48 over Oklahoma in the 2017 Rose Bowl College Football Playoff Semifinal. A friend in Pennsylvania, who’s not even a Dawgs fan, said it was “one of the best football games, pro or college or high school, I’ve ever watched.” It was the sort of back-and-forth game television loves, with both teams racking up more than 500 yards of offense in a battle that went into overtime, where Georgia finally won it on a terrific touchdown run by Michel, aided by a key block thrown by QB Fromm, sending the Dawgs to the national championship game. Michel and Chubb combined for 326 yards and 5 touchdowns.
5. Georgia 34-11 over Michigan in the 2021 Orange Bowl College Football Playoff Semifinal. After a disappointing loss in the SEC championship to Alabama, Georgia bounced back in an impressive way to secure its place in the national title game, scoring on its first five possessions.
6. Georgia 27-13 over Tennessee in 2022. Coming into the showdown Between the Hedges, the Dawgs were ranked No. 1 in the AP and coaches’ polls, but the Volunteers were the No. 1 team in the College Football Playoff rankings. As Joel put it: “Their offense was considered unstoppable,” and yet the Dawgs stopped it before one of the most raucous crowds in Sanford Stadium history. The Vols entered the game leading the nation at 49.4 points per game, but didn’t score a touchdown until there was just 4:15 remaining on the clock.
7. Georgia 42-7 over Florida in 2017. The Dawgs led this game 42-0 before the bench players gave up a meaningless touchdown with 2:42 left in the game. As my son, who grew up in the Steve Spurrier years, put it: “It was the dream beatdown we’ve never seen in my time as a fan. … This was sweet.”
8. Georgia 28-7 over Auburn in the 2017 SEC Championship Game. My lifelong friend Carlton Powell is so fond of this one that he ranked it No. 2 overall. The Tigers had given the Dawgs a beatdown three weeks earlier, which made this one even sweeter. Chubb was at his vintage best, breaking tackles with incredibly tough running. And, with Michel missing much of the game with a knee injury, talented freshman D’Andre Swift stepped up big-time, electrifying the UGA-leaning crowd with a 64-yard TD run. Meanwhile, the Georgia defense stifled the potent Auburn attack.
9. Georgia 20-19 over Notre Dame. Ultimately, I went with the 2017 game in South Bend, where Georgia fans basically took over the Fighting Irish’s stadium. This was the first big indication that the 2017 season was going to be special. And Terry Godwin made one of those spectacular falling-backward, one-handed touchdown catches. It was a great win, though it wasn’t a great game of football, as the two teams combined to punt the ball 17 times, eight by Georgia, in a largely defensive struggle. Georgia came back from trailing 3-0, 10-3, 16-10 and 19-17. The Bulldogs didn’t take their first lead of the game, 17-16, until the 4:34 mark in the third quarter, and finally went ahead for good with 3:34 remaining, when kicker Rodrigo Blankenship made it 20-19.
10. Georgia 13-7 over Auburn in 2016. As I wrote a couple of years ago in a look at the highs and lows of Smart’s first five seasons, this game in Athens saw an unranked home team that was a double-digit underdog upset its heralded visitor, giving its first-year coach his first win over a Top 10 team and his first victory over a big rival. Plus, Smart’s Dawgs held one of the nation’s best offenses to zero first downs in the second half. There wasn’t a lot for Georgia fans to savor in Smart’s first season as head coach, but this was a Dawgs defensive performance for the ages.
