Monday, November 29, 2010

Thoughts on Georgia Tech

As ugly as it was, damn it feels good to be bowl eligible. As Tech was driving to try and tie the game at 35 in the fourth quarter, I began to imagine how long the wait until next season was going to feel without a bowl game to look forward to. It made me feel sick to my stomach. But the Dawgs were able to salvage a victory to close what has been the strangest football season during my years as a Georgia fan. In the coming weeks, I'll take a look back at the 2010 season and examine what needs to be fixed before the Boise State game next fall. But for now, here are my thoughts on the victory over Tech.

- One of the biggest responses from Tech fans I have seen is that if Tech had Nesbitt, they would have easily won the game. In most cases, I would agree but Tevin Washington actually played a great game. He was perfect at timing his pitches and turned a couple of broken plays into long runs. He is certainly not the reason Tech lost but actually one of the main reasons they almost won.

- The only thing that could stop the Georgia offense from continuing to score points was Georgia. Georgia had 11 drives in the game, six resulting in touchdowns, one ending with a fumble inside the Tech 10, two turnovers on failed fourth down attempts, and two punts. Both of the fourth down failures were inside the 25. even if we only get field goals on those and the fumble, that is 9 more points on the board.

- The efficiency of the Georgia offense was amazing. Despite running about 50 plays less than Tech, the Dawgs racked up over 415 yards. Aaron Murray continued his brilliant season completing nearly 80% of his passes and adding 3 more touchdowns. With one more touchdown pass, he will tie the Georgia all-time record for touchdown passes in a season. He is now ranked 9th in all of college football in passing efficiency. Pretty damn impressive for a kid that some Georgia fans were questioning after G-Day (and calling for Mettenberger as starter before he was booted).

- If Caleb King and Washaun Ealey could fix the fumble issues, they really could be an amazing duo in the backfield. Both run extremely hard. Caleb can make special things happen, but continuing to put the ball on the ground makes him a liability.

- AJ Green and Justin Houston - if this is it, what a way to end it. Both were beasts.

- Grantham, you get a pass for this season. When we roll into Tech next fall, this better not happen again. 500 yards against a Tech team with its back up quarterback is unacceptable. When they run a fullback dive, they should not get 6 yards every time. And one more thing, when they run an option to one side, don't leave a corner back alone on a wideout as the only person to cover the pitch man.

In the end, the Dawgs won and that is what really matters. Thought I just say, Washaun Ealey running into the end zone when all the Dawgs needed to do to take a knee might have been the worst play I have ever witnessed. It is unacceptable that Richt got out coached by Johnson on that play. I have never had any doubt about Coach Richt's decisions on the field, but that was horrible.

Memphis, Nashville, or Birmingham here we come! In honor of Samuel L Jackson being on the sideline Saturday night, I leave you with this:


WE STILL RUN THIS STATE!!!

4 comments:

Tom said...

You're right about Nesbitt and the backup. Nesbitt is a horrible option quarterback but a great runner. The backup actually makes much better reads and executes the option better, but isn't quite the playmaker. He'll probably be much better next year.

Sports Dawg said...

Just like we would have defeated Florida several years ago had not D.J. been out. But he was and we didn't. Same with Yellow Tech and Nesbitt. A million teams could play that "if" game.

Inspector G said...

Well, I agree with most of what you said, but we didn't score 6 offensive touchdowns, only 5 Houston had one and Ealey's was garbarge, so only 4.

Amanda said...

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