Georgia football is just a couple days away from opening their 2025 season against Marshall. As one would imagine, the Bulldogs are massive favorites against Marshall as the FanDuel Sportsbook currently has them as a 39.5 point favorite.
In all honesty, that spread seems far too large for Georgia to be able to cover in the first game of their season, even against a team like Marshall that they are cleary much better than. Unfortunately for UGA, the data does back up how difficult it will be to cover this spread because Kirby Smart has actually never been able to cover a spread that is this large during his tenure at Georgia.
Data suggests Georgia has little chance at covering the spread against Marshall
According to On3, Georgia is 0-12-1 against the spread during Smart's tenure as head coach when they are favored to win by at least 38 points. So history shows that Georgia isn't a team to bet on when they are favored by this many points.
Data from last season also supports this theory as well. Georgia did finish the season with 11 wins and only three losses, but their record against the spread was horrendous. In fact, Georgia only went 4-10 against the spread during the 2024 season. Marshall on the other hand finished with a remarkable 11-2 record against the spread last year.
So what does this mean for Georgia? Not much at all.
Does anyone actually care if Georgia beats Marshall by 30 points instead of 40? Sure this would be a loss against the spread, but a 30 point win would feel just as good as a 40 point.
At the end of the day that is all that really matters to Georgia and their fans. All they want is for this game to be an easy and comfortable win, and if that happens but they fail to cover the 38.5 point spread then no one should really care.