Georgia football: players to watch against the Missouri Tigers

Georgia travels far west to play SEC East rival Missouri this Saturday. Kickoff is at noon, but in Missouri the time will be 11 a.m.

The South Carolina game ended up being a dud, let’s see if the Missouri Tigers put up more of a fight. They did last year. The Drew Lock led offense was the only team to score more than 20 points on Georgia football through the first two months of 2017. And that was during a night game in Athens.

Of course, Missouri’s defense was awful last year and the Dawgs scored 53 points while racking up 696 yards of offense (700-plus before kneeling out the clock). The Dawgs won 53-28 and continued to march to the National Championship Game.

This week’s game isn’t anywhere close to Athens, Georgia. The Dawgs and Tigers are playing in Columbia, Missouri. And Lock is no longer a developing junior. He’s a senior with 40 games under his belt. He’s got Emanuel Hall and Johnathon Johnson to throw to. Both had over 700 receiving yards last year. For Georgia to escape Mizzou with a victory, they’ll rely on these players to have their best performances of the season so far:

Deandre Baker, Tyson Campbell, and Richard LeCounte III

Obviously, against Lock, the cornerbacks and deep safety need to be at their best. Fortunately, Georgia has the best players for the job. Deandre Baker is one of the SEC’s only true shutdown corners. Lock barely threw Baker’s direction last year, instead, he picked on Malkom Parrish, who dealt with an ankle injury.

Parrish is gone, and in his place is true freshman Tyson Campbell. The Tigers possess the biggest challenge of Campbell’s short UGA career, but he’s done well so far. The one blemish on his season was the deep touchdown allowed against South Carolina late in the game after coaches had pulled most starters, including Richard LeCounte III who would have supplied the safety help.

The sophomore LeCounte is emerging as one of the nation’s top underclassmen safeties. He has great range and always seems to be in the right place. In situations where Baker or Campbell get beat, LeCounte has the ability to bail them out.

D’Andre Walker

Georgia’s lack of a pass rush has been greatly exaggerated. And you’re going to find out why this week thanks to D’Andre Walker. Dawgs only have one sack and 11 tackles for a loss. But that sack and six tackles for a loss came against South Carolina. Clearly, the Dawgs are capable of increasing the pressure when they need to.

This week is one of those games where they’ll need to. That should translate to a monster performance by Walker. The Mizzou offense is great, but their offensive line isn’t that impressive. They move the ball by spreading defenses and Lock’s quick release. Walker will force that release to be a little quicker, which should lead to some busted plays.

Jake Fromm

The best game of Jake Fromm’s career came against Missouri last year. He completed 18 of his 26 passes for 326 yards with two touchdowns. It was against the Tigers where he proved why he never relinquished the starting job to Jacob Eason. No play better illustrated why than his touchdown pass to Mecole Hardman where he backpedaled out of the pocket to get a clean angle to Hardman.

With Fromm looking better than ever early in 2018, and Missouri’s defense looking just as mediocre as 2017, Fromm will likely have another big game. They won’t be able to put enough pressure on him and Fromm just has too many receivers to throw to. The Tigers can’t cover them all.

D’Andre Swift

Fromm wasn’t the only player who had a career-best against the Tigers. D’Andre Swift did as well with 94 yards on just six carries. As a team, the Dawgs rushed for 371 yards, so expect a lot of yardage from Elijah Holyfield, Brian Herrien and James Cook.

But Swift is going to remind everyone why he entered the year as the team’s no. 1 back. He nursed a groin injury last week and he was probably healthy enough to play more than what he did. That just means he’ll enter Missouri with some extra rest. The Tigers gave up 37 points to Purdue last week so the last thing they want to see is a fresh Georgia running back. But that’s exactly what they’re going to get with Swift.