Dawgs Clobber Sooners in the First Game of a Double-Header Sweep

Darrell Huckaby is a syndicated columnist and author of six books including two about Georgia football. Read Huck’s Wit and Wisdom every Wednesday and Sunday. Subscribe at https://dhuck.substack.com/.

Dawgs Clobber Sooners in the First Game of a Double-Header Sweep

I hate to be greedy, but I am. We are living in the Golden Era of Georgia Football and I want even more. But Saturday—well, Saturday was just about dead solid perfect.

Physical. Relentless. Oklahoma quarterback John Mateer is supposed to be quite a football player, and I'm sure he is. But Saturday afternoon he had about as much fun in Athens as General Sherman would have had at a United Daughters of the Confederacy luncheon.

People like to talk about how Brent Venables is a defensive genius and about how tough the Oklahoma defense is, but Georgia's defense didn't let Mateer and the Sooners piss a drop all day.

Every time Oklahoma appeared ready to do something productive, somebody wearing red knocked somebody wearing white backward, took the football away from him, or both. The defining moment came when Mateer lost the football and Georgia linebacker Chris Cole picked it up and ran 85 yards for a touchdown.

Eighty-five yards. I got tired just watching him.

By halftime it was 28-0, and the Oklahoma players were probably wondering whether that covered wagon could get them to Hartsfield before Delta closed the door. The Sooners eventually scored 13 points after the game was essentially decided.

Good for them. Participation trophies are usually readily available in the visitors' locker room on Dooley Field.

Oklahoma finished with 65 yards rushing. Sixty-five! Herschel Walker used to get 65 yards walking from the huddle to the line of scrimmage.

Georgia's offense wasn't exactly clicking on all cylinders, either—at least not in the third quarter. Didn’t need to be.

Gunner Stockton threw for 171 yards. Georgia had 306 total yards.

But when your defense keeps giving you the football, you don't need trick plays, smoke machines or a 48-page laminated play sheet.

Take the ball. Score. Kick off. Hit somebody. Repeat.

That's Kirby Smart football.

And speaking of King Kirby, there is another important development that deserves our attention. The King has now covered the spread four straight weeks.

Four.

Straight.

Weeks.

At this point, Las Vegas ought to quit setting Georgia's line and just call Kirby.

“Coach, we're thinking Georgia minus 13½.”

“Make it 17.”

“Yes, sir.”

King Kirby has apparently decided it isn't enough to beat the other team. He wants to beat the bookmakers, too. I don't gamble on football because I was raised Methodist and was taught gambling was a sin unless it involved a church raffle. But I do understand point spreads.

And four straight covers will get the attention of people who keep a bookie in their contacts under “Cousin Eddie.”

Georgia is 4-0. The Dawgs are ranked No. 2. And they are beginning to develop the personality of a team I really enjoy watching. They aren't cute. They aren't flashy. They aren't interested in winning the press conference. They just beat on you.

Georgia football under Kirby Smart is becoming less like a track meet and more like getting hit repeatedly in the forehead with a ball-peen hammer. Eventually you lose interest in continuing.

Oklahoma lost interest sometime around the middle of the second quarter. And that alone would have made for a wonderful weekend. But there was more. Oh, yes. There was much more.

Because after Georgia was finished beating the stuffing out of one of the most storied programs in college football history, in the wee small hours of Sunday morning, our little buddies from the North Avenue Trade School had decided to take a field trip.

They traveled roughly 2,500 miles to California to play Stanford. Stanford! One of the worst football teams in America. It was an Atlantic Coast Conference game.

The Cardinal came into the weekend needing a victory worse than a Baptist preacher needs somebody to say “Amen.”

So naturally Georgia Tech flew all the way across the country and gave them one.

Stanford 34. Georgia Tech 27.

I want you to appreciate the logistics involved here.

Tech had to pack helmets, shoulder pads, uniforms, medical equipment and probably several slide rules. They had to load buses. Go to the airport. Board an airplane. Fly across three time zones. Cross most of the continental United States. Land in California. Unload everything. Ride to the stadium. Dress out. Warm up.

And then lose to Stanford.

Gentlemen, there had to be an easier way. You can lose football games in Atlanta. I’m sure The Citadel would have been available for the right price.

Think of the frequent-flyer miles they could have saved.

So, let's review.

Georgia 41. Oklahoma 13. King Kirby covers again. Four straight weeks. The Dawgs remain undefeated. The defense is playing like somebody insulted their mothers.

And Georgia Tech traveled 2,500 miles to get beaten by a team whose mascot is a tree.

I don't know what I did to deserve a football weekend like that, but I'm grateful.

Some Saturdays are good. Some Saturdays are great. And occasionally the football gods look down upon the state of Georgia, smile upon the Bulldog Nation and arrange everything exactly the way it ought to be. And for good measure the US wins comes from behind to win the President’s Cup after the real president shows up to give them a pep talk.

Ain’t life grand? Look for me next week at the Vandy game. I’ll be the good looking old man in the red shirt, the one smiling from ear to ear.

Darrell Huckaby