ATLANTA – Leave it to Georgia to ignore the chaos and carnage, and dutifully reset college football’s October trip down the rabbit hole.
Right back to where it should be.
Excuse the most complete team in college football for that hiccup two weeks ago, that last-second giveaway to an Auburn team that just lost for the fourth time.
Use the 9-game schedule excuse, or whatever they do to make themselves feel better about losses in the big, bad SEC. None of that matters.
Georgia’s loud, undeniable statement in a 27-8 rout of Florida on Saturday is all you need to know about the head of the table
in the College Football Playoff race.
There’s the Boogeyman ― with the best roster and the best coach in college football — and there’s everyone else.
Miami? The calendar has turned to November, and the ACC schedule is still the ACC schedule.
Ohio State? New quarterback, big problems.
Defending national champion Indiana? The magic, everyone, left with Fernando.
Unbeaten Utah and UCLA? Great stories, no business being on the same field with Georgia.
Then again, neither does any other team in the SEC, whose coaches constantly whine about depth and insular destruction, and how many of those teams could actually make a run in the CFP? If your answer includes Ole Miss or Texas, I’ll remind you that Florida — which couldn’t block Georgia, couldn’t move the ball and was overwhelmed for 60 minutes — beat both of those teams.
Alabama is flawed, and could be looking for a new coach come December, after USC fires perpetual underachiever Lincoln Riley. Kentucky is raw and unproven, and not every SEC road game is Texas A&M, Oklahoma and South Carolina, fellas.
And for the love of Lane, please don’t talk about LSU ― which has played two games of significance and lost both.
Two weeks ago, Florida beat Texas in Austin, found a starting quarterback and was surging. The Gators left Atlanta with another blowout loss, another year of searching for answers to the problem that won’t go away.
The same problem the rest of college football now has to deal with over the second half of the season.
If there’s one truism right now in college football, it’s this: hell hath no fury like a ticked off and motivated Georgia. And Georgia with two weeks to prepare for a rivalry game? Forget it.
This is the beauty of Georgia coach Kirby Smart, who has won 10 of 11 in this series, and won them every way possible. Routes early on in the decade of dominance gave way to fourth-quarter saves, which then led to the statement game of this season.
The Georgia defense flexed, and Florida had no response. Four turnovers, and a run game that averaged less than three yards per carry with the best running back in the SEC (Jadan Baugh).
There were sacks and pressures and tackles for loss. There was pressure off the edge, and the interior pocket collapsing and coverage over the top in the secondary that eliminated any mistake.
A defensive clinic unlike anything we’ve seen from a Smart defense since the back-to-back national championships in 2021-22. Jalen Carter and Jordan Davis and Nakobe Dean aren’t running around now, but there could be just as many NFL draft picks off this defense. They’re just not household names yet.
There’s junior edges Chris Cole, who returned another fumble for a touchdown, Justin Williams and Quintavius Johnson, and freshmen edge Khamari Brooks. And that’s just part of a deep, and interchangeably devastating front seven.
And if we’ve seen anything in the past three seasons of Big Ten dominance in the national championship game, it’s that defense dictates CFP runs. Michigan, Ohio State and Indiana all had elite defenses that set the tone in every playoff game.
So Georgia doesn’t exactly have an elite offense, and can’t stress defenses any number of ways with a variety of skill players. It doesn’t need to.
Midway through the fourth quarter, with Florida trailing 24-0 in a game that seemed like 44-0, a Georgia turnover gave the Gators an opportunity to avoid their first shutout in this rivalry since 1982. Since a grown man named Herschel was running over everyone and everything.
It took an interference call in the end zone on fourth down to give Florida a shot at ending the shutout. Smart was furious with the call, and was still stalking the officials as Tramell Jones converted a short run for Florida’s first points of the game.
Hell hath no fury like a ticked off Georgia.
Right back where it should be.
Matt Hayes is the senior national college football writer for USA TODAY Sports Network. Follow him on X at @MattHayesCFB. Listen to him daily, from 12-2 p.m., on 1010XL-Jacksonville.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: College football had its fun. Georgia is back to ruin everyone’s season
