Photo: DawgPost.com
First off, huge congrats and kudos to the UGA offensive line. Our QBs had all day to pass most of the game, and we ran for almost 200 yards. I certainly didn't expect that going into the game. In particular, Nick Jones and Chester Adams absolutely mauled their counterparts all night long.
Also, the UGA defensive line completely stuffed the Gamecock run and let us keep the passing game in front of us. Charles Johnson played extremely well, Jeff Owens made some huge plays and even Dale Dixson blew up some early running plays.
Other Items of Note:
- Matt Stafford (The Good) - He wasn't rattled by the moment, the crowd, Joe T's injury or his own mistakes. He just went out there and performed as best he could. And his best is pretty impressive.
At FSU, Richt made liberal use of the crossing patterns over the middle to create big plays. We haven't really seen that at UGA with Greene or Shockley. Some of that has been due to our WRs consistenly falling down after the catch, but it also may have to do with Shockley and Greene's ability or inability to hit WRs in stride. Stafford threw two lasers in this game across the middle. One to Martrez, who caught all his passes, and one to Mohammed Massaquoi. Both were big plays because Stafford has the gun to hit them on the run. This threat opens up huge possibilities for our offense. Yards after the catch might finally become a reality for this offense.
- Stafford (the bad) - Obviously a 3 INT and 0 TD stat line won't win many games. However, it was enough to win this one, and for a debut start it was enough to beat a Gamecock squad that will struggle to win seven games.
On the brightside, he's all upside. He'll get the vast, vast majority of first team snaps for the next 4-6 weeks while JT3 heals. If Tereshinski is out until the Florida Game, Stafford will have taken almost as many 1st team practice snaps as Joe T has taken in his entire 5 year career. Plus, Stafford will have started twice the number of games as Joe T by the time Joe comes back.
- Spurrier Shutout - Never saw that coming. No better tribute to Erk is possible. GATA defense.
- UGA DBs - I know Sidney Rice struggled with cramps late, but you can't say enough about how well our guys played against Rice. All of Chris Smelly's 64 yards came after UGA had already gone to a prevent defense aimed at letting the Coots have short screen plays while chewing up the clock. You take away that last drive, and the defense gave up 156 yards passing to Spurrier. Nice.
- Michael Turner's Injury - It will be interesting to see what happens here. He played a very good ball game, and we need him to keep Shack and Inman fresh.
- Coaching / Motivation - It seems that we sleep walk into this game most of the time. We seem to show up in Columbia with a far lesser degree of passion than the Gamecocks, and the outcome is closer than we'd like. This wasn't the case on Saturday. Maybe it was Erk's death. Maybe it was something else, but we gave the Gamecocks all the wanted from the jump.
- The Talent Gap - Staggering. The Gamecocks simply don't have the talent along either line of scrimmage to compete with UGA. The offensive line talent is particularly weak in Columbia. The Gamecocks only started 3 seniors on offense or defense in this game. That would suggest that in 2007, they should be loaded.
However, I would argue that if you return a half dozen starters who aren't SEC caliber, that's not a recipe for success. They must dramatically improve their recruiting to take any meaningful steps forward becauase along the lines they aren't anywhere close to being a big boy SEC program. That said, their talent at the speed positions (WR/DB) is very good. - The Schedule - (as I posted on David Ching's Blog) Stafford, Richt and UGA all caught a HUGE break with the schedule this year.
South Carolina isn't very good. Neither is WKU, UAB, Ole Miss or Colorado.
Maybe Stafford didn't play well enough last night to beat UF or UT. But we didn't play them. And he should get better every week. He's got 2 more home games and a light weight SEC road game to get more of the kinks worked out before we play UT.
It's on Stafford, Bobo and Richt to ramp this kid up as quickly as possible, and the schedule is certainly in our favor.
pwd
