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Georgia Draft Profile: Stetson Bennett

Palmber-Thombsby: Palmer Thombs04/25/23palmerthombs
Stetson Bennett (5)
INGLEWOOD, CA - JANUARY 09: Georgia Bulldogs quarterback Stetson Bennett (13) holds the championship trophy after the Georgia Bulldogs defeated the TCU Horned Frogs in the College Football Playoff National Championship game on January 9, 2023, at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, CA. (Photo by Brian Rothmuller/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

It’s officially draft week in the NFL. Come Thursday, players from all across the College Football landscape will start to find their new homes. Last year that happened in record breaking fashion for the Georgia Bulldogs with 15 players picked. It won’t be quite that many this year, but Kirby Smart’s crew still should be well represented in the selections taking place over the course of three days in Kansas City.

With double-digit Georgia players expected to be picked, DawgsHQ prepares you by taking a look back on their respective collegiate careers with our Georgia Draft Profile series. Next up, the man that led the offense in each of its last two titles and to many it may feel like he quarterbacked the 1980 team too with how long he was in school, quarterback Stetson Bennett.

Stetson Bennett

Height: 5-foot-11

Weight: 192 pounds

Arms / Hands: 28 7/8 inches / 10 inches

High School / Hometown: Pierce County / Blackshear, Ga.

On3 JUCO Industry Ranking (2018): No. 185 overall, No. 8 quarterback, No. 35 in state of Mississippi

Stetson Bennett started his college career at Georgia as a walk-on in 2017. He transferred to junior college and came back to the place it all started on scholarship. Not only that, Bennett ended up leading the Bulldogs to their first National Championship in 41 years before doing it AGAIN the very next year, becoming the first back-to-back champions in Playoff history and only the sixth in since the latter half of the 20th century.

Yeah, Bennett’s story could be a movie. Everybody knows that. But, at the same time, he’s one heck of a football player too, and the story sometimes causes folks to forget that.

Bennett became the first Georgia quarterback to throw for over 4,000 yards in program history during the 2022 season, completing 310 of 454 passes for 4,127 yards and 27 touchdowns. He also added 10 more scores on the ground. Doing so earned Bennett a spot in New York as a Heisman Trophy finalist while he also won the Burlsworth Trophy as the top former walk-on and the Manning Award as the nation’s top quarterback, including postseason play in the decision process.

In Bennett’s six-year collegiate career – one of which he spent at Jones College in Mississippi – he saw action in 41 games. Bennett started five during the 2020 COVID season, taking over in the first half of the season-opener against Arkansas to save the day for the Bulldogs before starting the next five. However, Bennett wasn’t playing well against Florida, and in Georgia’s next game, JT Daniels took over as the starter, ultimately leading the Bulldogs to a 4-0 finish and a Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl win over top-10 Cincinnati.

Daniels entered the next season as the starter. However, he couldn’t quite manage to stay on the field as he battled a pair of early-season injuries. That opened the door for Bennett to move back into the starter’s role, and the rest was history. Bennett would go on to lose just one game in his final two seasons as he led Georgia to back-to-back titles.

What’s in store for him at the next level? Well, Bennett is being doubted again, and he’s not likely to hear his name called until the later rounds of the NFL Draft. That probably puts him as a backup once again. However, if history has shown us anything with Stetson Bennett, it’s to not count him out regardless of the situation. Given the chance, he’s got a track record of taking advantage of an opportunity.

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