After CFP Folks Blew It Last Week Regarding Georgia And Tennessee, They’re Forced To Get it Right This Time

The supposedly No. 3 Georgia Bulldogs clobbered supposedly No. 1 Tennessee so badly Saturday at Sanford Stadium in Athens, Georgia that the Volunteers went from orange (you know, their preferred color) to just black and blue.

Are you paying attention, members of the College Football Playoff (CFP) Selection Committee?

The only thing surprising about Georgia’s thorough whipping of Tennessee was that it wasn’t worse.

Actually, it was.

Tennessee led the nation in scoring at nearly an average of 50 points per game, but Georgia couldn’t care less.

Despite the Bulldogs losing eight defensive starters to the NFL last season (including a record five as first-round draft picks), and despite a season-ending injury for prolific linebacker and team leader Nolan Smith after the previous week’s game against Florida, Georgia kept Tennessee from managing a touchdown during this supposedly Game of the Century until barely four minutes left in the fourth quarter.

There was that stifling defense. There also was a lot of quarterback Stetson Bennett, suddenly among the strongest of Heisman Trophy candidates, completing 17 of 25 passes for 257 yards and two touchdowns, and he also used his legs for a rousing 13-yard dash to the end zone.

Mostly, there was Georgia dominating Tennessee offensively, defensively, physically, mentally and absolutely.

“When you play Tennessee, they go for the knockout blow in the first round. You’ve got to survive (Tennessee’s knockout blow), and I don’t like surviving anything.,” Georgia coach Kirby Smart said after a 27-13 victory for his 9-0 Bulldogs who trailed two minutes into the game following a Tennessee field goal.

Soon, Georgia was up 21-3 by the time all of the 92,746 folks finished squeezing into the stadium early in the second quarter. It wasn’t a Game of the Century as advertised, but it was huge at the box office. According to the Atlanta–Journal Constitution, vividseats.com placed the get-in price for Georgia-Tennessee at $568, and the paper added the prices for all tickets increased 156% throughout the season as Georgia stayed strong and Tennessee got stronger.

Seats on the 50-yard line were running around $3,200. Since there only was a sprinkling of orange here and there around the stadium beyond the normal sections allotted to the visiting team, there were more Georgia than Tennessee fans spending all of that loot, and those Georgia fans weren’t upset.

Defense, defense. Apparently, those on the CFP selection committee dismissed Tennessee’s highly suspect defense that always was there (ninth in the 14-team SEC in total defense to Georgia’s No. 1 before the game).

Bennett kept using his arm and his legs to terrorize Tennessee with a mighty assist from wide receiver Ladd McConkey (five catches for 94 yards and a touchdown), and the following became obvious early: This wasn’t 1966 Notre Dame-Michigan State or 1971 Nebraska Oklahoma or 1993 Florida State-Notre Dame or 2008 Florida-Alabama or any of those other real Games of any Century.

This was Georgia proving its the best team in the SEC East, the SEC and the whole country. It went back to Smart’s pregame strategy: “We want to attack (them), but with them, it’s about surviving that knockout blow.”

No problem, for Georgia, the defending national champions who were ranked No. 1 in the country before the game by the Associated Press and by the USA Today coaches poll and by everybody else with a football brain — except for those on the CFP selection committee.

After CFP members finished gathering last week for the first time this season, they had Tennessee No. 1, Ohio State No. 2 and then Georgia, but with Tennessee-Georgia on the horizon, there was history. Not good history for the Volunteers who had lost five straight times to Georgia by an average of 20 points or more. They also had a 12-game losing streak against teams ranked No. 1.

Then Tennessee traveled south from Knoxville to battle the Bulldogs and their crowd, which was so loud that it forced the visitors’ supposedly flawless offense into seven illegal-procedure calls to match the seven sacks for Georgia’s defense against a team that previously had allowed 10 all season.

“Our fans were elite today,” Kirby said after the stadium’s video board showed decibel meter readings beyond 125 multiple times throughout the evening.“We asked them to be (loud), and they responded. They get the second-place vote.”

The Bulldogs will get a first-place vote this week from everybody, even from CFP folks who haven’t a choice.