Death, taxes and Georgia and Alabama squaring off in a huge college football game.
The Bulldogs and Crimson Tide are renewing their rivalry once again this Saturday in the SEC championship game at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta. The two teams already met once this year back in late September when the Tide won 24-21 and snapped Georgia’s 33-game home winning streak that had lasted since 2019. It was Georgia’s only regular season loss this season.
For much of this season, that loss appeared to doom Georgia’s hopes of playing for an SEC title as Texas A&M raced out to an 11-0 record. But on the last weekend of the regular season, the Aggies fell on the road to Texas which opened the door for Georgia to secure a spot in Atlanta and thus another chance to play the program that’s had their number lately.
Alabama head coach Kalen DeBoer is 2-0 against Georgia, and Bulldogs head coach Kirby Smart is just 1-7 all-time against the Tide compared to 107-13 against every other college football team. Although, to be fair, their lone win was the 2021 National Championship game, which is definitely not nothing.
Georgia, Kirby Smart's mindset heading into Alabama rematch
Still, Smart’s dubious record against the team he served as defensive coordinator for from 2008-15 has been the one blemish for the man almost universally regarded as the best in the business.
"I mean, what's everybody else's record against them?” Smart said after the Bulldogs’ loss to Alabama in September. “You've got it? I don't either. I don't lose sleep over that because those games have been championship-caliber games. And even when we play in the regular season— I just saw 25 scouts out there. They're all there to watch these teams play. That's not gonna affect me.”
Just over two months later, Smart will get his chance to prove that it doesn’t affect him.
This game serves as another opportunity for his Bulldogs to buck the national consensus that they can’t get past the Crimson Tide. A win wouldn’t completely dispel the narrative of course, (he’d still be 2-7) but it would bring Georgia its second straight SEC title and give Smart his first win over DeBoer, both of which would be big notches on the program’s belt.
The Bulldogs are 0-3 against Alabama in SEC championship games, with their most recent such loss in 2023 derailing a 12-0 season when they had a shot at three straight national titles.
Though Smart is 1-7 against his former team, he’s 3-0 when playing the same team for a second time in a season. Two of those games came in the SEC championship, in 2017 against Auburn and 2024 against Texas, while the other was of course the aforementioned national title win over Alabama that snapped Georgia’s 41-year championship drought.
And even with the “Georgia can’t beat Alabama” narrative surely set to dominate the discourse, in all practicality this is a much more crucial game for the Tide than it is for the Bulldogs.
Alabama has more pressure than Georgia
Even with a loss, Georgia is almost a lock for the College Football Playoff with an 11-2 record. But a third loss for Alabama and no conference title would likely knock them out of the playoff entirely, or at the very least really put those hopes on ice. The Tide’s season depends on whether or not they can keep beating Georgia.
In their first meeting this season, Alabama put up a 24-point barrage in the first half and converted a whopping 13-of-19 third downs on the night. The Bulldogs shut them out in the second half, but were ultimately done in by missed opportunities including a dropped touchdown by wideout Taylyn Taylor, a Nate Frazier fumble deep in their own territory and a failed 4th-and-1 attempt in the fourth quarter.
Alabama has dominated the rivalry with Georgia lately, but hasn’t exactly looked infallible this season overall. Since bouncing back from a season-opening loss at Florida State with that win over Georgia, they’ve lost to Oklahoma for the second straight year and got all they could handle from Missouri, South Carolina and most recently Auburn.
Georgia had its fair share of close calls after playing Alabama as well, namely against Auburn and Florida, but also picked up statement wins over Ole Miss and Texas. They’ve looked much more dominant lately, but did have to get an ugly 16-9 win over Georgia Tech last Friday where the offense sputtered and standout center Drew Bobo left with what could be a serious injury.
It usually results in a classic whenever these two teams take the field and it’s almost always a high-stakes situation. This year is shaping up to be no different, although the Bulldogs are hoping the result in the win column is indeed a change from the last three times they’ve done battle. The opportunity to end Alabama’s season while avenging their only regular season loss must sound quite nice.
“If we do what we’ve got to do, it’ll all work out for us,” quarterback Gunner Stockton said.