Georgia head coach Kirby Smart answered questions from the media on the SEC Coaches Teleconference on Wednesday morning ahead of the Bulldogs marquee matchup against Tennessee on Saturday.
Both Tennessee and Georgia badly need to earn a win for its College Football Playoff hopes. A win for Tennessee would also move them a win away from clinching a birth in the SEC Championship.
Smart discussed if he’ll believe Tennessee’s availability report about Nico Iamaleava, Georgia being very banged up and much more on Wednesday. Here’s everything Smart said.
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Opening statement
“Our guys are excited to get a home game. It’s been quite a while since we got a chance to play at home. And it’ll be not only a home game but a home night game with a lot of fanfare and a lot of game-day attention. So any chance you get to have the country tune into your home and your city, it’s a special event. And this has been a big rivalry for a long time. And Tennessee is playing really good football and we’re looking for an opportunity to to go out and play again.”
On what he has seen from Tennessee’s defensive line, what stands out about the Vols and how they operate
“Well, the depth is definitely strong. They play a lot of players, which allows them to play really hard, really physical. You can see the strain in the guys that come into play. There’s really no drop off when they go from their first-line guys to their second-line guys. And they roll those guys in early in games. But they strike, knock back on the line of scrimmage, really offensive and defensive line, both. But that’s where the game’s won and lost in our league. It’s the people they they can run the ball effectively and they can protect the passer. And they’re doing both right now and do a great job up front.”
On Georgia falling nine spots in the College Football Playoff rankings after the loss at Ole Miss
“Yeah, I don’t have a lot of control over it. You know? It’s one of those things. I mean, I’m so worried about this game and focused on it, I didn’t get to really see or hear anything from last night. And tried to really tune all that out because the most important thing we can do is improve, play better, and try to play well. So I’m not interested in excuses. I do know that playing on the road in the SEC is one of the hardest things to do. I’ve always said that. And nobody knows this league better than I do. I do know that when you go on the road and play in this league, it’s extremely hard and tough. And we’ve played some really good teams, especially on the road.”
On how they interpret the status of opposing player on the SEC availability reports each week
“It depends on the team. But honestly, I don’t really pay much attention to it. I mean, I look at it and see it, but it’s not a lot of control you have over that. So when it comes out, it doesn’t matter if you’re skeptical of it or not. You got to prepare your team to play. And these teams we play in the SEC, they have capable backups, so it’s not like, once you’re in the probable or questionable area, you know there’s a chance they can play. So that’s what you go with.”
On what impresses him about Dylan Sampson, his workload
“Their ability, his vision, his toughness. He’s a really patient runner. He understands their run scheme, and he knows exactly what he’s looking for in terms of cuts, patience. Very hard to tackle, elusive, and he has great, he has track speed. Just been very impressed with him. He’s a really good football player.”
On how he feels like his defense has tackled the last couple games
“Good and bad. We’ve lost our edges there against Florida for some time, and I thought we tackled the Ole Miss backs well, but we didn’t necessarily tackle well out in the open field space. Space throws, where guys caught the ball and ran with it afterwards. We want to have no yards after the catch and we had some of that that we don’t want.”
On if he’s surprised that Texas is the only SEC team in the top six, if this is a point of conversation for a potential nine game SEC schedule
“You got to figure it’s going to come up. I mean, it’s not the time or place now, but I think Greg Sankey— he does a great job with our leadership, but he’ll be thinking long and hard about how the outcome— I mean, it’s a long way from over, but how the outcome comes out in this whole thing. I don’t know that it’s just about the nine games. It’s about everything because we certainly feel like the strength of our conference is really strong and that there’s going to be more and more parity. We’ve seen that this year. And what does that equal to in terms of the eyes of the committee? Because I think they’re the judge and the jury in terms of college football, and they make the decisions sometimes based on things that we may not agree with. But they’re the ones that are making the decisions, so there’ll be some decision making have to be made depending on how this thing turns out.”
On if Georgia RB Cash Jones is dealing with a leg injury
“We’ll see when the injury report comes out.”
On the running back room being banged up, the status of that room
“I mean, we’re banged up as a whole. I’ll be honest with you. It’s not something that I bring up and talk about, but in the world we live in, maybe we should be talking about it. I don’t know. I’m not into excuses, but we’ve got you know, five offensive linemen who’ve missed time or have missed an entire week of practice and that’s tough. So it’s been kind of by committee and just trying to get guys to the game and not able to practice. So between Tate (Ratledge), Jared (Wilson), Micah (Uini), Dylan (Fairchild), Earnest (Greene)— they’ve all been dealing with injuries. So it’s been tough on those guys, and they continue to push through and try. Same thing at running back because we’ve had the guys out at running back and had a lot of guys injured at that position, so it’s welcome to the SEC when you play the number of games we play. It’s a physical tough game.”
