Kirby Smart aware of target on Georgia's back
Georgia has a chance to do something really special in 2022. It has a chance to do something that is just plain special, too. Reaching the College Football Playoff, playing for, and winning a second straight National Championship is special. Doing that with a 15-0 record would be the aforementioned really special.
It starts Saturday in Starkville, Miss. That’s where Georgia will take on Mike Leach’s 6-3 Mississippi State squad as 16.5-point favorites. It’s the first of two-straight weeks on the road to end conference play as the Bulldogs will go to Lexington, Ken. on November 19.
Kentucky is just inside of the College Football Playoff Top 25. Mississippi State isn’t in there. It’s not like this is a murderers’ row of tough opponents but the Bulldogs are No. 1. Just like when No. 1 came to Athens, Ga. last week, those home fans will want to help their team gain a notch in the belt.
Georgia has spent a lot of time in that No. 1 spot over the past couple of years. It is nine-games into a National Championship defense, too. It’s not lost on the Bulldogs that they are bound to get the opposing team’s best shot.
“I feel like we’ve had a target on our back all year,” Kirby Smart said after Tuesday’s practice. “I really don’t feel like that changes, right? When you won the national championship the year before, there’s a target on your back from day one. It doesn’t change regardless of your record or the venue that you play in. We talk about toughness and DNA, and DNA travels. If you have good DNA, it travels with you.”
Smart’s team is talented, deep, fast, and all of the adjectives a coach would want to be used to describe his roster. The seventh-year head coach has stated numerous times how important it is to get talented players. It’s high on his list of priorities.
But Smart has begun placing a bigger developmental emphasis on other aspects of team building and championship acumen over the past couple of years. Georgia has strived toward total team connection and being the most mentally tough and composed team on the football field.
The work the Bulldogs put into those areas is for such a time as this upcoming two-game stretch on the road.
“We don’t do all the exercises that you do to build composure to not use it,” Smart said. “We anticipate it’s an opportunity to flex our composure muscle, our resiliency muscle, our connection muscle, and our toughness muscle. We don’t do all that lifting and preparing to not use it. I expect our guys to use it, and when or if we need it, you have got to be prepared for that. It’s a really tough place to play, and they’ve got a really good team.”
