Smart’s attention turns to chemistry for new Dawgs
ATHENS, Ga. — University of Georgia coach Kirby Smart made his annual trek to Lake Oconee this week to compete in the Peach Bowl Challenge at Reynolds Plantation. And for the first time all year, he didn’t win.
Smart’s Bulldogs won the College Football Playoff championship with a 33-18 victory over Alabama on Jan. 10 in Indianapolis, and they won the NFL draft with five first-round picks and a record 15 players overall selected in the seven-round event that wrapped up last weekend.
But the best that Smart could muster on the golf course this past week was a fourth-place finish out of 11 teams. He and former Auburn coach Tommy Tuberville, who now represents Alabama in the U.S. Senate, played together in a two-man scramble format that paired active coaches with “legends,” as the event bills them.
They were battling for shares of a $330,000 charity purse. Smart and Tuberville received $12,500 apiece for their foundations. The winners were Randy Edsall and Houston Nutt (neither of whom is an active coach), and they split $70,000.
Smart’s golf game is likely the furthest from the minds of most
Georgia fans. They probably want to know what the Bulldogs are doing to prepare for next season. That will start Sept. 3 with a highly anticipated matchup against Oregon in the Chickfil-A Kickoff game at Atlanta’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
Smart addressed both during a brief interview interlude during the golf tournament.
The Ducks will be under the direction of first-year coach Dan Lanning, most recently Georgia’s defensive coordinator. So that’s an extremely intriguing factor.
“We looked at them in the spring and kind of studied those guys,” Smart said. “It makes it awkward, you know, with the new head coach. You can look at the film and everything, but you’re really looking at who the players are more than anything. We’re very familiar with Dan Lanning and we’re very familiar with a lot of guys on his staff. Their offensive coordinator (Kenny Dillingham) was at Auburn and also at (Florida State), so we looked at those (teams). But I have a lot of respect for Dan and what he did for our program, and I know he’ll do a really good job there at Oregon.”
As for how the Bulldogs’ offseason has been different after winning the program’s third consensus national championship but first since the 1980 season, Georgia fans likely will recognize Smart’s remarks.
“You worry about complacency; you worry about guys thinking they’ve arrived,” Smart said during the 6 1/2-minute interview. “I didn’t think our guys did that. We’ve got a shrunk window, a shorter window, so we had less time to prepare, one less week to lift before spring practice because we played an extra game in the season with the playoff game. So injuries have played a factor. We probably had more guys out this spring than we ever have before.
“But the biggest thing is to not worry about that. We don’t defend a title. We start new with a new team, and we’re trying to develop new chemistry to see what this team is going to be.”
Smart also joked that his golf game was better during the pandemic than it is now, after things have gotten back to normal.
The university began spring semester final exams Thursday, so Georgia coaches will have no interaction with the players through the coming week. Graduation is scheduled for May 13, and grades will be posted three days later.
Between now and then, it will be mostly golf for Smart. While keeping a close eye on the NCAA transfer portal, of course.