Kirby Smart hopeful to get Mykel Williams back and he’ll need him to beat Jalen Milroe and Alabama

Georgia junior pass rusher Mykel Williams has been sidelined since going down in the Bulldogs Week 1 win over Clemson with an ankle injury. However, coming off a Week 4 bye, head coach Kirby Smart was feeling optimistic about Williams’ chances of playing in No. 2 Georgia’s top-five clash with No. 4 Alabama in Tuscaloosa on Saturday. 

“I’m hopeful,” Smart told reporters on Monday in the lead-up to the game. “We’ll see. He didn’t do much last week. He got a lot of rehab Friday and Saturday and was able to run Friday and Saturday, which is positive, but he hasn’t been out there at practice.” 

Without Williams, Georgia has still managed a 3-0 start with 2.5 sacks per game, led by hybrid linebacker Jalon Walker. Georgia could also get interior defensive linemen Warren Brinson and Jordan Hall back for the team’s second game of SEC play. However, the Bulldogs and defensive coordinator Glenn Schumann desperately need a healthy Williams off the edge to help continue Alabama’s experienced quarterback, Jalen Milroe. 

In last year’s conference championship game, Milroe led Alabama to a 27-24 win that punched his team’s ticket to the College Football Playoff. However, Milroe only completed 13 of his 23 attempts and averaged just 8.3 yards per attempt, his lowest of the season to that point. 

A big reason for Milroe’s lack of success throwing the football was the pressure that Georgia’s defensive line was able to apply. The Dawgs pressured Milroe on 12 of his 29 dropbacks, sacked him four times, and crucially contained the mobile quarterback, forcing him to hold the ball for an average of 3.70 seconds and only scrambling twice. 

Williams was a huge part of that pass-rush plan. Walker provided five of those pressures in just seven pass rush snaps, but Smart and Schumann didn’t trust the 6-foot-2 245-pound linebacker to consistently line up on the edge against Bama’s massive offensive tackles, instead employing him as a pass-rushing specialist. Williams played 37 snaps as a sophomore in that contest and recorded two pressures. 

If Williams isn’t healthy enough to play on Saturday, Walker will be forced to play all three downs like he did against Kentucky with 27 of his 48 snaps on the edge. Walker posted a 55.9 run-defense grade against Kentucky according to PFF and in both of his run-defense snaps against Alabama last season, the Crimson Tide ran it right at him. 

At 6-foot-5 265-pounds, Williams is considered a top-10 prospect in the 2025 NFL Draft. His production has never quite matched his measurables, similar to a player like Travon Walker when he was at Georgia and became the No. 1 overall pick in the 2022 NFL Draft, however, his NFL size will be a tremendous asset against an Alabama offensive line that features a 6-foot-5 325 pound left tackle, Tyler Booker, and a 6-foot-7 369 pound right tackle, Kadyn Proctor, protecting Milroe, who himself is 6-foot-2 and 225 pounds. 

Milroe has never excelled under pressure, often resorting to his exceptional athleticism as a get-out-of-jail-free card, but his improvisation led to 44 sacks last season with a 31.8% pressure-to-sack ratio. With new head coach Kalen DeBoer, Milroe has improved to just a 25% pressure-to-sack, but that’s still 22nd worst in college football. 

As a redshirt junior, Milroe is making an effort to play the position instead of taking off at the first sign of trouble. He has only scrambled five times for 51 yards and 47 of those came in Week 1 against Western Kentucky. That doesn’t mean, however, that he’s playing better in the pocket under pressure. 

Milroe still has a time to throw of 3.03 seconds and is being pressured on 31.6% of his dropbacks. On those dropbacks, he’s completing just 46.2% of his passes. Georgia desperately needs to slow Alabama’s run game on early downs and they have a much better chance of doing that with Williams on the field. 

The reason that’s so important is that it will put Alabama in late-down passing situations where Walker do what he does best, take over as a pass-rush specialist, and Milroe will be forced to do what he does worst. So far this season, even with three blowout wins, Alabama has a 17.5% passing success rate on late downs. If Georgia can consistently get Alabama into third-and-pass situations, then it should win the game. Mykel Williams gives the Bulldogs the best chance to do that, which is why Smart is so “hopeful” he can return.