ATHENS - It is traditionally one of the biggest games on the football calendar - the Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry between Georgia Football and the Auburn Tigers.
And Saturday morning ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit delivered this message to Kirby Smart’s Georgia Bulldogs:
“The big thing for Georgia is just putting last week behind them, respecting Auburn and doing what they do,” Herbstreit said on ESPN’s College Gameday.
Earlier this week he said the Dawgs were the No. 1 team in the country, which is something that's backed up by the team being ranked No. 1 in both polls.
In regular-season games following matchups against top-ten teams Georgia is 18-0 under Kirby Smart.
Dean Legge.
“Georgia is an awesome team," he said. "You can make a strong case right now they’re the best team in the country. They’re ranked No. 1. I love their team. I love everything about them."
A week ago Herbstreit was on the call when the No. 2 Bulldogs took out No. 6 Alabama 20-17 at Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa. Over 12 million people tuned in to watch the game - making is the second-most watched game of the season so far (Ohio State-Texas).
Now the Bulldogs have to adjust to the reality of a rivalry game against an Auburn team that’s struggling to find its footing under first-year head coach Alex Golesh. The Tigers (3-2) had the week of to watch their two biggest rivals square off last weekend.
“They have a lot of talent. They got good football players and it's any given Saturday in this conference, as we see every week, will be a extremely physical game. They're coming off an off week, and we're coming off a really tough physical game,” Smart said Monday. “So it'll be really important that the mindset and the approach to the game is right because they wanna make it physical the way they play. They're a really tough physical football team on both sides of the ball. And Coach Durkin, their defensive coordinator has been one of the best in the conference over all the years he's been in the conference. He's a great defensive football coach. We got a lot of links - a lot of respect for him. Our guys have to get ready to go play.”
The Dawgs have been in this situation before. Kirby Smart is 26-11 against top-ten teams. In regular season games following matchups against top-ten teams Georgia is 18-0 under Kirby Smart.
In other words: Kirby’s Dawgs have not had a lot of problems “putting last week behind them” over time. The Georgia coach said earlier this week that this rivalry is special for him.
“It's an awesome rivalry. It's one that was special to me growing up close to Auburn,” he said. “I actually lived closer to there than any other SEC school. I have known a lot of coaches there and seems like from the two places I've worked most of my life, that's been a permanent rival - certainly been a very traditional rivalry both places I worked and have so much respect for them.”
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