Georgia football will face a lot of challenges when they battle Alabama in the SEC Championship game this weekend. Obviously Alabama is a very good team that Georgia can't seem to ever beat, but the Crimson Tide have one thing going in their favor that UGA will have to overcome.
And unfortunately for Georgia, there is nothing that they can really do to limit this advantage Alabama has.
Georgia must overcome significant disadvantage in SEC Championship game vs Alabama
Alabama's season is on the line this Saturday in the SEC Championship game. That may be a wild thing to suggest since one would normally assume that both teams in the SEC Championship game are a lock to make the College Football Playoff, but that isn't the case this year.
Alabama will likely enter this matchup as the No. 10 team according to the CFP rankings. That makes them the last at-large selection into the playoff which gives them zero room for error. Even if most college football fans agree that teams shouldn't be punished for losing their conference championship game, Alabama would likely drop at least one spot if they lost to Georgia.
Knowing that they would fail to make the CFP if they lose, this will give them extra motivation they may not normally have had. And this is motivation that Georgia does not have as they will make the playoff even if the lose to Alabama on Saturday.
This doesn't mean that Georgia won't be motivated to win this game. In fact, there is no team Georgia and Kirby Smart want to beat more than Alabama because of their issues against them in recent years. So if anyone is able to overcome this disadvantage it is Georgia, because they have just as much motivation to finally take down Alabama than they do to make the College Football Playoff.