An SEC gauntlet awaiting Georgia

ATLANTA — The first half of the season was a breeze for No. 2 Georgia.

No daunting opponents. No game closer than two touchdowns.

Now the real season begins.

The Bulldogs must run a gauntlet of four consecutive games against SEC opponents currently ranked in the top 25, beginning with Saturday’s trip to No. 13 LSU.

“Anytime you go on the road in the SEC, it’s an adventure,” Coach Kirby Smart said. “We’re going to play some good teams coming up, absolutely. It’s tough everywhere in the SEC. Go talk to Tennessee and ask them the road they’re dealing with. Go talk to LSU — they just played Florida.

“I mean, there’s no time to cry about it. Nobody wants to hear that. You gotta get ready to go play.”

Coming off a trip to the national championship game, Georgia (6-0, 4-0 SEC) has yet to be seriously challenged.

But beating teams like Austin Peay and Vanderbilt by an average of nearly 30 points a game makes this a rather mysterious team. Even this deep into the season, no one is quite sure how the Bulldogs will react when inevitably faced with an opponent that can match up with them physically and hang around well into the second half.

“We just know that from this point going forward we need to be on our A game, because this is our meat of our schedule,” receiver Terry Godwin said. “We haven’t played our best yet.”

Making this stretch even more challenging is that only one game is between the hedges.

After traveling to LSU (5-1, 2-1), Georgia has an off week before heading to Jacksonville for their Cocktail Party game against No. 14 Florida (5-1, 3-1). That’s followed by another true road game at No. 18 Kentucky (5-1, 3-1), before the Bulldogs finally return to Sanford Stadium to host No. 21 Auburn (4-2, 1-2).

If the Bulldogs get through all that unscathed, they’ll almost surely head to the SEC Championship Game with a 12-0 record. The final two games are both at home against lowly Massachusetts and state rival Georgia Tech.

“Every week, the team gets better, they get more experience,” tight end Isaac Nauta said. “Obviously, we’ve got a tough stretch up ahead with a lot of good opponents, but our preparation’s not going to change. If anything, we’re going to push harder because we know the competition’s going to get better. It’s exciting knowing you’re going to go into some of these big games and that’s what you want to be a part of being a football player.”