A Totally Not Unbiased Look at Saturday’s Football Fairytale

AP Photo/Mike Stewart

It’s been a trying year for us Georgia Bulldogs football fans. We knew we had an uphill climb this year with a schedule that included away games at Alabama, Texas, and Ole Miss, but we had a formidable team, including a quarterback who was a preseason Heisman favorite and potential first-round draft pick in Carson Beck.

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But nothing is a given in the Southeastern Conference (SEC). For years, I’ve said that there are so many good teams in the SEC that it could easily cannibalize itself any season. We experienced how tough the SEC can be this season.

For starters, our game against Kentucky, which usually plays tough against us, was awfully close for comfort. Then we lost to Alabama, and Beck developed a case of the turnovers for several games. Our receivers had a difficult time with dropped passes, and a loss to Ole Miss made us wonder if our College Football Playoff hopes were in jeopardy.

Somehow, the stars aligned. Beck defeated his turnover tendencies, we beat Texas and rivals Florida and Tennessee, and the other dominoes fell (i.e. other teams lost) that put us in the SEC Championship game. The day after a nail-biting Black Friday eight-overtime win over kid brother Georgia Tech, we found out that our SEC Championship opponent would be Texas — a rematch.

The narratives began: It’s hard to beat a team twice in one season! Texas could win the SEC Championship in its first year in the conference! ESPN especially doubled down on the narrative that Texas was the best thing to ever happen to the SEC.

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We opened up Saturday’s game with Texas as a three-point favorite. Throughout the first half, Beck and the Bulldogs’ offense struggled to manufacture anything, and Texas’ offense stayed on the field forever. However, our defense held the Longhorns to a pair of field goals, and Texas was leading 6-3 when the unthinkable happened on the last play of the first half.

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Big questions loomed over halftime. Would Beck be back? What adjustments would Georgia make? How would head coach Kirby Smart and his offensive staff deal with a Beck injury, however minor?

We had an answer when Beck came out of the locker room with his arm wrapped in plastic with ice on it and backup quarterback Gunner Stockton with his helmet on. Stockton’s abilities were never in doubt, but he remained untested in big, consequential games — until now.

Stockton came in and brought the Bulldogs back. While we saw his inexperience come into play, he showed poise and confidence, and he kept us in the game — including the first touchdown of the entire game. However, Texas wasn’t giving up either, and suddenly we found ourselves in our second consecutive overtime game.

Texas went first in overtime and kicked a field goal. It was Georgia’s turn to drive, and we got near the goal line, and another scary moment involving the Bulldogs’ quarterback happened.

After that hit, Stockton had to exit the game for one play because his helmet came off. What would Georgia do next? We soon found out when Beck came back into the game, his right arm dangling by his side. He handed the ball off to Trevor Etienne, and the rest was history.

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Some of the players on Georgia’s offense didn’t even realize that Beck was coming in until right before the play, including guard Tate Ratledge.

Stockton showed shades of Stetson Bennett by stepping up when his team needed him the most. His teammates knew that he could make it happen.

“Him coming into the game made everybody realize that this is the new juice that we’ve got to come into the second half with,” Ratledge said. “Of course, it’s never a good thing when your starting quarterback goes out, but I think it was big for everyone in that locker room to know that everyone believed in him.”

“Gunner is him. He’s that guy,” Etienne said. “I expected nothing less from him. I’m proud of him.”

When you’ve had the season that we’ve had, you’re prepared to expect the unexpected. We received the #2 seed in the College Football Playoff, which means we get a bye week and don’t have to play again until Jan. 1. That’ll give some of our guys time to get healthy, but no matter what happens, I’m confident in our future with Stockton at the helm.

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