The 3 most important players on Georgia football's roster for 2024

The college football world has anointed Georgia as the favorite to win the national title in 2024, but Kirby Smart has publicly questioned his roster heading into the year. While the Bulldogs are loaded with talent, the roster isn’t perfect and a few holes could be exploited if these three players don’t perform this season. 

Of course, Georgia needs Carson Beck to play well to reach its ceiling, but after nearly throwing for 4,000 yards last year, that feels like a given. Beck enters the year as a clear Heisman Trophy candidate, but he’s still counting on the rest of the roster to win it all. 

In the secondary, Georgia has real question marks behind Daylen Everette with a three-man fall camp battle to start the year as CB2. Julian Humphrey and Daniel Harris don’t have much FBS experience, but if Ellis Robinson IV wins the job, he’ll be taking his first collegiate snaps in a crucial role for the best team in the country. 

So, without any certainty across the field, Everette needs to be excellent for Glenn Schumann’s defense in his junior season. Last year as a sophomore, playing as CB2 opposite Kamari Lassiter, Everette finished the season with an interception and four pass breakups, but he gave up three touchdowns and allowed a reception on 53.7% of the targets in his direction. 

Everette doesn’t need to be a ball-hawk for the Georgia defense, but he needs to limit his side of the field without much safety help, so Malaki Starks and others can give help to Humphrey, Harris, or Robinson. 

Georgia has long been Running Back U, but last year the Bulldogs didn’t have a dominant back and this offseason were forced to go into the transfer portal to replace Daijun Edwards and Kendall Milton. Plucking Trevor Etienne out of Gainesville was good business, but Georgia still lacks depth in the backfield and Roderick Robinson going down with turf toe in fall camp puts even more pressure on the Florida transfer. 

Last season for the Gators, Etienne split time with Montrell Johnson Jr. and finished with 753 yards and eight touchdowns on 131 carries. Now, in Athens, he’ll be Georgia’s featured back and may be asked to carry the ball 200 times across a long run to the national championship. 

Etienne will need to maintain his efficiency on increased volume and must stay healthy for Georgia’s offense to be elite. Beck and Bobo leaned heavily on play-action last year, and for it to be effective, Etienne and the run-game must be a big threat. 

Nazir Stackhouse is not the best player or biggest name on the Georgia defense, but especially at the start of the 2024 season, injuries have made him the most important. Warren Brinson came into camp dealing with an Achilles injury, Jordan Hall suffered a stress fracture in his tibia that required surgery and will keep him out to start the year, and, now, Xzavier McLeod is battling an abdominal strain. 

Brinson should play against Clemson and though he’s not expected to, McLeod might be healthy enough to go, but that still leaves Georgia much thinner up front than they’ve been in a while. Stackhouse was named to the preseason watch list for the Outland Trophy after playing 409 snaps on the defensive line last season. 

At 6-foot-3 320 pounds, Stackhouse will plug up the middle and allow Georgia’s young linebackers to make plays, but if he gets pushed around by Clemson’s offensive line in Week 1, Georgia’s run defense will have big problems.