Time to shake it off and appreciate the special era of UGA football we’re witnessing.
One loss shouldn’t outweigh the spectacular run Kirby Smart’s Dawgs have had over the past three years.
And missing the playoff shouldn’t overshadow the fact that an injury-plagued but resilient Georgia team managed to go undefeated in regular-season play for a third consecutive season.
Losing to Alabama in the SEC Championship game was upsetting, yeah, but UGA fans mustn’t forget that their team came within a couple of plays of getting a chance to accomplish what no other college program has done in nearly 90 years.
I’ve been preaching for the past couple of seasons that we’ve been privileged to watch Georgia football’s greatest run ever, and we should savor how special it has been.
As Jason Hasty, the athletics history specialist at UGA’s Hargrett Library, said this week, it just felt great this season to be a two-time defending national champion “and to enjoy this run of excellence that Coach Smart and his team have put together.
I hope all of us fans are basking in this Golden Age of Georgia football, but certainly for those of us who’ve followed the team for decades this era is especially satisfying.”
While Georgia only occasionally has put a bad team on the field, he noted, “there were years when it felt that the ultimate prize was just too far away for us to ever grasp.
Grasping that prize (twice!) has made all those years of disappointment and ‘maybe next year’ seem worthwhile.”
Jason’s right. Sure, it hurts for the Dawgs not to have made the College Football Playoff this year after being at the top of the polls all season, but I’ve been dismayed by the way some fans have responded, saying that if Georgia isn’t going to be in the playoff, it should have turned down the Orange Bowl in protest. That would have been shameful.
This was just one of those seasons when losing one game at the wrong time made all the difference.
Had the Dawgs lost a regular-season game but still made it to Atlanta and beaten Bama for the SEC title, they would have made the playoff as a one-loss champ, just as the Tide did.
