It would be pretty easy for Georgia football to overlook Marshall this Saturday. They are massive favorites in this game and are expected to dominate the moment the game begins.
But Kirby Smart is doing everything he can to make sure his team takes this game seriously. Smart knows Georgia is trying to build for something greater than this one game, so he needs his team to be as focused as possible to put themselves in the best position going forward the rest of the season.
Smart addressed this topic on Monday during his press conference by giving his team a stern warning about the importance of the next few days leading into Saturday's game.
"I was telling guys just the other day, there's three more games before the game: one today, one tomorrow, and one the next day, and those opportunities are really valuable in terms of where guys rep, where guys will play,” Smart shared via 247Sports.com. “So we've got a lot of good battles going on.”
Kirby Smart reminds his team of ongoing position battles
Smart made it very clear in the above quote that his team is competing with each other right now, not just Marshall. According to Smart, there are still a lot of position battles still going on right now, so if that doesn't keep his team focused than likely nothing will.
This is how Smart has always run his program though. He never guarantees anyone any amount playing time going into a season, and he also is willing to change who the starter is week to week as well. So just because a player starts week one against Marshall does not mean they will be the starter throughout the rest of the season.
This strategy has worked out for Georgia in the past as it helps his team push themselves every single day in practice. This forces Georgia to get better each and every day instead of just being complacent with where they are at during the season.
It will obviously be interesting to see who the starters are for Georgia during their game against Marshall on Saturday, but it's important to remember that UGA's starters will change a lot throughout the season as well.