Georgia football: Dawgs exorcise ghosts of past Jacksonville collapses

Georgia football delivered a loss No.4 to the Florida Gators as the Dawgs earned their eighth straight victory in dominating fashion. They proved they are ready to take it all the way and end their title drought. This win shows regardless of who Georgia plays — they will find a way to win.

The Dawgs beat Florida 34-7 and moved to 8-0 overall and 6-0 in conference play. It wasn’t a pretty win, but Georgia’s defense got the job done, and the offense scored when it mattered.

This rivalry game isn’t supposed to be pretty, and for 95% of the game, Georgia’s team had the Gators in a chokehold, but they scored and reminded the Dawgs who they were playing.

Florida will never just lay down in this matchup, so to beat them by 27 points is still a statement.

So many times, this game resulted in heartbreak for Georgia teams, not this year. The Dawgs flexed, took a moment, and proved they are supposed to be the No.1 ranked team in the country.

Not this time, Georgia wanted to win this game so badly, and despite their mistakes, this win is noteworthy.

Yes, there is a standard now that the defense shouldn’t give up any points, and while that is fine, an offense as talented as Florida’s is going to find ways to score. The thing to take away from this game is it took them the entire game to earn just one touchdown.

Not to mention, the defense was on the field for 32:20, so by the time Florida scored, they were getting tired, which isn’t a negative thing, just what happened.

Also, the Dawgs have only allowed opponents to score 53 points on them in eight games. It would have remained at 46, but the Gators made a play when they needed to.

Georgia’s offense decided to take a shot downfield with a 27 point lead, and Stetson Bennett threw his second interception of the game. The Dawgs should have run the ball. Georgia needed to force the Gators to stop them, but instead, they gave them their scoring-drive opportunity.

It was silly for offensive coordinator Todd Monken to call that play, and while Bennett can make that throw most of the time, he wasn’t as accurate against the Gators as he usually is.

Even though Florida scored, Georgia wanted to beat them by almost four touchdowns, so with a 2:49 to go, they handed it off twice, and on that second run, Zamir White went 42 yards to the house to score.

White became the first Bulldog to rush for over 100 yards on the season as he finished with 14 carries for 105 yards and one touchdown, averaging 7.5 yards a touch.

Those three second-quarter turnovers were the turning point of the game because the Dawgs scored 21 points off of them while the Gators only scored seven points off three turnovers.

Without those three touchdowns, this game wouldn’t have ended the same way. Those 21 points gave the Dawgs enough confidence to win this game.

Georgia better count their blessings because the turnover fairy visited at the right moment. Giving up 161 rushing yards isn’t ideal, much less giving up their second rushing touchdown on the year, but we can overlook those after looking at how long the Gators were on the field.

Florida was the last major test before Atlanta for Georgia. Now they just need to play smart and keep earning style points.

The Dawgs got over their first hump by beating the Gators when they needed to produce a dominating win. Now just need to close out the next four weeks and get ready for Alabama or whichever SEC West opponent they’ll take on in Atlanta. 

This win is huge for Georgia, bigger than getting three ranked wins in a row, because this rivalry game was something that held the Dawgs back so many times, but not this year, and we will take it.