ATHENS — Georgia head football coach Kirby Smart, along with quarterback Carson Beck, spoke with media Monday to discuss the upcoming SEC Championship game against Texas. They offered the following comments:
Head Coach Kirby Smart
Opening Statement…
“We're on to Texas, got started on these guys yesterday. Obviously, we had the teleconference, I guess, so you guys know that already. Sark [Steve Sarkisian] has done an unbelievable job, first year in our conference. I don't know why I feel like they've been in the conference forever because of them playing in the playoffs last year and they had the series with Alabama. So, you've seen them on tape and their team is built like an SEC team. He's done a tremendous job. Their defense is one of the best in the country. They've got explosive skill players. Did a tremendous job in the portal. Their quarterback is playing at a high level, and they've replaced a big group of backs. The backs they've got are doing a great job. So, all in all, should be an exciting, challenging SEC championship.”
On how the teams have improved since the first meeting…
“I don't know how to answer that. It doesn't seem like that long ago that we played them. I guess it was October, mid-October or so that we played those guys. There are areas that we have played better in and then areas that we haven't. And it's almost gone both ways in terms of games we played better in certain areas and then games we didn't play better in certain areas. Offensively, we didn't run the ball really well against these guys. We kind of succeeded off of their mistakes, their turnovers. And we scored points off of their turnovers. But we've played well offensively at times since and we've played well defensively at times since. But we've also not put a complete game together. And that's probably what we're trying to do best now is play our best when our best is needed. As far as them, they've improved in a lot of ways. I think defensively they've been at a high level the entire year. That's not, you know, I think offensively they've run the ball. They've committed to running the ball, being really physical. You know, they've had 30 and 40 carries, runs in several games and a commitment to that and a physicality while also being able to throw the ball really efficiently. They've got the weapons to do both.”
On the biggest challenges of a rematch…
“They're the same challenges as they were the first time you played them. You know, I'm a big guy of statistics and philosophies and things like that. I mean, in the NFL you play everybody in your division twice, you know, and then you might meet up with them again in the playoffs. So, you know, when you flip a coin, there's no greater chance that it's heads or tails the second time you flip it. And I'm not comparing our game to a coin flip. I'm just saying that the previous matchup does not determine this matchup. You can't overstate that to your players because the flow of that game was different in the first three, four, five drives. And then, you know, after a turnover it went the other way a little bit. And then momentum swung throughout that game and momentum is going to swing throughout this game. It's just the way these games are. It's more about who executes well, who tackles well, who doesn't turn the ball over and who has explosive plays. That's what it comes down to every game.”
On the defensive line’s performance against Georgia Tech…
“I actually was very pleased with our defensive line against Georgia Tech. I thought we struck play blocks really well in a really tough situation. I mean, we had 16 second-and-longs. So, if you told me before the game, we were going to have them in second-and-seven plus 16 times, I would have thought that we did something really, really well. What we didn't do was play really well on a couple of the second longs and a couple of the third downs, which really cost us. But the defensive line, we played more players there. We had to go into the well and play some younger guys. And they struck blocks and did some good things. What was the second part of your question? Yeah, it's a different kind of challenge. They're massive, extremely physical. You know, the Georgia Tech challenge was very different because it was like playing Wildcat quarterback. And they're both definitely challenges, but these guys have a lot of weapons around the quarterback, and they use all of them well.”
On Arch Manning’s performance this season…
“He's what everybody thought he was. He's athletic, smart, thick, great thrower. He can run their entire offense while at the same time creating designed runs or off-schedule runs. Both are scary because designed runs with him are tough to defend because you're having to defend the whole field, and then he's also an elite thrower and passer. He's a great player, and they brought him along the right way. He's gained confidence each and every week in the way he plays. He got to start some games. You couldn't write a better story for him in terms of development to be ready to go and be the starter.”
On Cash Jones’ value on third down…
“Experience. I think third down is a lot about what you've seen in your career. The biggest jump for a running back from high school to college is third down because you're asked to do a lot of things on third down, more than you are first and second. Cash's experience with his years here, I mean, he's gone through three springs, four springs of third downs. He's gone through four camps of third downs. He's a tremendous athlete. He's one of the best hand-eye – He spent a year on the scout team as a receiver, guys. There are clips of him running around out there against Kamari (Lassiter) and Kelee Ringo, like going one-on-one at receiver, and he's catching deep balls. So, he's like a jack of all trades.”
On the defense’s varying performances…
“I do know that when we execute well, we play well, we have great resiliency. But the trait that confounds you or bothers you is that when something goes wrong. Like any explosive play or any penalty that extends a drive has almost been catastrophic. Like we can't stop anybody if that happens, and we have not overcome that well. What we have done is stop people when we've had to. Played well in the red area. For a while there, we played really well on third down. But you can't put a finger on exactly what it was. If I could do that, then we'd certainly put a stop to it. But we've played well at times, and we've tackled well at times, and then we haven't at times. We've had more injuries than we've ever had in terms of guys in and out. But we don't use that as an excuse around here.”
On Carson Beck maintaining consistency…
“Carson's (Beck) very consistent in his thought process, his makeup, his process. You have to judge whether he's consistent on the field because I think he has been. I think people judge it on stats. They don't judge it on what we see. The day in, day out process oriented of what he's going through and what he's doing for the offense has been very consistent.”
On Branson Robinson’s status and Roderick Robinson’s return…
“We're hopeful to get Branson (Robinson) back and bring him back at the speed that he's comfortable with and that he feels comfortable with. I thought Rod (Robinson), I don't know how many snaps he played, 25, 28 snaps, something like that. For a guy that had not played tackle football in a long time, he got his first live action back and he's still gaining confidence. He's still getting his play speed back. You can't replicate what he did in the game in practice. We try to. He got good reps during the week. I thought he did a great job in pass pro, an area that he's taken pride in, two minute, catching the ball. He's just got to get back comfortable carrying the ball, running the ball, doing those things. He's certainly very talented and we hope that the longer he's coming back, the more he gets back to 100%. He can't just jump back out there and be 100%.”
On if more coaches should be on the College Football Playoff committee…
"I don't know. I don't know the best, because I don't even know the makeup. I don't know the exact number of coaches versus administrators, who all is in there or who should be. It's not something that I concern myself with because I don't have a lot of control over it. I certainly think that there's people that can make that decision better than me who all needs to be on it. They have to have a regional representation. I think that's important, but it's not something that I'm focused on right now."
On Dillon Bell’s impact on the team…
"He adds toughness, experience, quickness. He's got body quickness and the ability to win one-on-ones. I think he came out of the game pretty healthy. I think it bothered him once, but it was good to get him out of it healthy because we need him to be healthy for this game. Kirby, I'm still in the process of sort of compiling this, but with regard to Carson Beck, fourth quarter on, second half on, it seems like he just takes it to a different level. We certainly saw that this past Saturday night."
On Carson Beck’s second-half performances…
"Yeah, I don't know how to answer that because I don't separate it. I mean, the stats do, but the stats are for guys that look at stats. I just look at what he does on the whole. Does he make the right decision? Does he make the right read? And that's not separated by halves or quarters. I just think the process he goes about to do it is you can make a case that we have not started fast and well. Is that Carson Beck's fault? I can't sit here and say that's Carson Beck's fault. I can say that Carson Beck is responsible, just like every quarterback is for things, but there are other things that affect that, and they're outside of his control. I think Carson Beck does a good job preparing for games. I certainly think throughout his high school career, going back to the playoff run he made at Mandarin when he led them to a state championship, which I think was his junior year, he played well in those games, and he's played well to finish and end of our games as well. So, I mean, he's a clutch guy. He's a competitor guy, but I'm not questioning his ability to play in the first half just because of sheer numbers."
On the defense starting strong early…
"I don't think you lean on that. You need to play well throughout, right? You need to start fast. You need to get off the field and give our offense field positions. One of the things we haven't done a good enough job this year with our defense is creating field position advantage for our defense. We have had a lot of stops where we catch a ball on the 10-yard line, they start there, or we give up a field goal, and that's great, but that's not what we want to be. We want to stop people and force them to have to throw long third downs and then get the ball back to our offense. I don't think you can say we're confident that we can stop them when we have to. We need to be confident we can stop them."
On the timeouts called in overtime and Travaris Robinson…
"T-Rob [Travaris Robinson] does a great job. He and Donte [Williams] both do. They both are responsible for our secondary, and they both, one work with the safeties, one works with the corners, but they provide a lot of help to Glenn [Schumann] in game plan, in-game adjustments. They're both really good coaches and help out all our defensive staff pitches in regards to that. Then the timeouts are more relative to whether or not you feel like you're in a good call against the look. That could be offensively or defensively. I mean, you can't take it with you, so it's one of those that you use it if you think it's an advantage."
On Fran Brown’s success at Syracuse…
“His son and my son are really good friends, and so they went to school together, played football together, and played basketball together, so they're good buddies. And it was the morning. We didn't have a game. It was the morning before their game, and just wished him luck and congratulations on a great season so far. That was the biggest thing. Fran's done a great job. Fran made me a better coach. Fran thanks me all the time for what Will and I did for his career and spent time with him, but Fran did more for us than we did for him. I mean, he's a great recruiter, great person. He taught me a lot about managing players, talking to players, coaching players, and then he learned a lot of scheme here, and he's been around a lot of good coaches. It's not like this is his first place around good coaches. He's been a great man, father, husband, but also a great coach, and I knew he'd make a great head coach. He said that was his goal when he came. He said, I want to be a head coach, and I said, well, we'll work together. You help me, and I'll help you, and both of us held up our end of the deal, and I'm so happy for him and not shocked at all because he's hired a great staff, and Fran has a way with people. They like Fran. Those players are going to fight like hell for Fran.”
On supporting Carson Beck…
“Well, everybody do their job beyond just receivers and catching balls. The number one way to get them to catch them is to throw to them more, so we've got to continue to show confidence, let those guys make plays. You help the quarterback with a better run game which that might be some communication by Carson to them who we're working to and some communication by the O-line. It might be reads by our backs, and our backs running the ball better and seeing the holes and reading things better. We've got young backs who sometimes they, hey, they're going to hit it. They're going to go run hard, but there's more to a run game than just how hard you run, so there's a lot of things, tight ends, making plays, which we're able to do in some of the Tennessee game. It dictated that to us, and it's not as simple as, well, we've got to target this guy more. We've got to target that guy more. A lot of our offense is full field reads, and it's not predicated on who the ball is going to. It's predicated on who the defense is giving the most space to, and that's probably the biggest thing is that I think guys have played well at times around him, and he's got to play better. He knows that, and everybody on offense does. So does the defense for this game.”
On Steve Sarkisian’s play designs…
“Yeah, he’s in attack mode. He's threatening you on the width of the field and the vertical part of the field, and now more than ever the interior between the tackles run game. So he's going to challenge you in every facet of the game and create matchups through motions and orbits. He does a tremendous job of the use of his personnel. It's why they've been successful.”
RSr. QB Carson Beck
On the first Texas matchup…
“I think the most memorable moment in that game is when their fans started to throw stuff onto the field. That was one of the crazier moments in a game that I've ever experienced. But, I mean, that environment was a lot of fun to play in, and ultimately coming out with a win in that environment was really good for our team. Obviously, they're a really good team. They have a good defense, a really good offense, and they've been really consistent throughout the season. They pose a good challenge for us, and it's for the SEC. I'm excited, and I know the guys are excited for this opportunity.”
On improving performance since the first Texas game…
“Yeah, I think if you go back and watch that game. There's just some situations where maybe I was trying to force the ball when I didn't need to, and maybe trying to make plays when they weren't there. I think that's one thing that I've really improved on as we've gotten into this kind of later half of the season is not trying to do too much and just playing within myself and playing within the offense, knowing when to try to make a play and knowing when to just chalk it up and move on to the next one. There's three downs to get a first down for a reason. You don't have to try to get it all in one play. I think I've done a better job at that in the second half of the season.”
On performances late in games…
“I mean, obviously when you get to the fourth quarter and you're down and you gotta have it, you make it happen. I think in pressure moments and pressure situations, I've been in those my entire life, so it really doesn't feel like pressure. That's what I love to do. When those moments do come, it's either you do it or you don't, and as a team and as an offense, we've really excelled in those moments. You try not to get into those moments, but we have been in those moments this year, and we've been able to execute when we get there.”
On the unfinished business of winning the SEC Championship…
“This year hasn't been easy. It's been challenging. It's been more difficult than in years past, at least since I've been here. As far as the road to how we got here…It hasn't been all butterflies and rainbows, win every game by 50/40. No, every game has posed a challenge, and we've had to fight consistently week in and week out. Our schedule wasn't easy this year, and we knew that's how it was gonna be. Here we are in this position with everything that we want in front of us, and I know the guys are excited. I'm excited. Even though it hasn't gone exactly how we want it to, we're exactly where we want to be. So, we're just really excited for this opportunity and the rest of the season looking forward.”
