Why 12-0 may not be enough for Georgia to reach playoff
This isn’t exactly the way it’s supposed to go down in the regular-season finale for Georgia football under Kirby Smart.
Georgia Tech had been an appetizer of sorts before the main course.
Dropping a game to Alabama this weekend would leave unbeaten Georgia on edge for more than 16 hours until playoff bids are revealed the next day.
Smart, after his team left with a 31-23 victory at Georgia Tech last weekend, was asked in the postgame press conference if his team was worthy of a playoff spot already or if it will come down to beating Alabama?
“I really wouldn’t even want to answer that, you know what I mean,” said Smart, whose team is seeking history as the first team to become three-peat national champions since Minnesota in the mid-1930s. “I’m so worried about what we’re doing and getting better, I’m going to leave that to you guys. Like I’m not worried about lobbying. I’m worried about playing for an SEC championship, which is really hard, really hard to get.”
Heading into championship weekend there are four unbeaten Power Five teams: Georgia, Michigan, Washington and Florida State. Oregon and Texas could be one-loss conference champions.
An Alabama win would likely move the Tide ahead of Georgia, but a Big 12 champion, one-loss Texas that beat the Tide in Tuscaloosa may be hard to leave out of the playoff.
Georgia would have two wins against 10-2 teams: Missouri and Ole Miss.
“We ultimately appreciate the opportunity to go out there and compete against them but I think at this point now it’s about maximizing the opportunities that we have and going forward trying to be the best version of ourselves,” center Sedrick Van Pran-Granger said.
Alabama just avoided coming to Atlanta, where the SEC championship game is held, as a two-loss team until an improbable 31-yard touchdown pass on fourth-and-goal beat Auburn 27-24.
Smart said Georgia was warming up on the field at Georgia Tech and somebody told him that Auburn had won because it was “fourth-and-whatever. I didn’t think about it again until we were coming in somebody said they converted that. I never saw it. Just heard it.”
Among playoff contenders, Georgia wasn’t alone in slogging through a rivalry game win.
Florida State trailed Florida 15-14 before scoring 10 fourth-quarter points in a 24-15 win. The Gators dropped to 5-7.
Washington’s Apple Cup could have turned rotten, but the Huskies went to 12-0 after a 24-21 home win over Washington State, which also fell to 5-7.
“You see across the country in these rivalry games what happens,” Smart said. “I know better than anybody than it can go either way in these type games. Very emotional, very different week.”