First thought on Gator Bowl

Okay, it’s my second.  My first was wondering how long it’s been since we could accurately refer to the venue as the Gator Bowl.  But I digress.

I’d like to think that this will be a game where everybody manages to stay the hell out of Todd Gurley’s way and let him tote Georgia to a win, but seeing as 2013 can be characterized as the Year of Living Generously, it should be no surprise that this Georgia fan’s mind worries about turnovers, among other things.

The pleasant surprise is, for once this season, that the Dawgs are actually playing a team worse in the turnover margin department than they are.

The Bulldogs are minus-six in turnover margin, 13th in the SEC and tied for 97th in the nation. Nebraska is even worse — the Huskers are minus-12, tied for 119th in the nation.

The problem isn’t so much giving the ball away a lot as it is forcing turnovers. Nebraska has come up with only three fumble recoveries this season in the run-oriented Big Ten, and has 16 turnovers.

Georgia has only six interceptions in the pass-happy SEC and has 14 turnovers gained.

In games against D-1 opponents, Georgia is 2-4 in games in which it had a negative turnover margin.  (I assume you can do the math on what that means when the Dawgs didn’t lose the turnover battle.)

Nebraska’s story is more interesting.  The Cornhuskers are 4-3 in similar games, but those games were their last seven straight of the season.  Nebraska is a whopping minus-17 in turnover margin over that stretch.  Wowzer.

Those are two trends that give me some hope, but we’ll see.

39 Comments

Filed under Georgia Football

39 responses to “First thought on Gator Bowl

  1. Who is calling the game?

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  2. Ghost of Logan Gray

    I just hope our staff was watching the UNC game. Unless my eyes were deceiving me, I saw a little wideout returned a punt for 6. Turns out it has happened 5 times in one season for him. And I thought punts could only be fair caught…

    With all of the athletes in this state, I think we could find our own Switzer. Games are won and lost on plays like that. Others have commented here about our team’s tendency to play not to lose. A complete lack of effort to flip field position or (gasp) score on punt returns is a prime example. We have been doing it for too long. There is no bigger Richt fan than me but aggressive play isn’t just about going for the occasional onside kick or going for it on 4th down. This fan wants to see the Dawgs assert their will against any and all opponents.

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  3. RP

    I feel like we will take a scrimmage mentality into this game. I dont see the point in just giving it to Gurley 40 times. Richt and Bobo use this game to give Mason reps and Gurley will not hit 20 carries.

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  4. Bright Idea

    Our defense will have to not let Nebraska have 7-8 minute possessions if we want to ride Gurley. I expect us to get behind early but will we be giving up field goals or touchdowns?

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  5. I’ve watched a ton of Nebraska games under Pelini. His teams turn the ball over at the absolute worst times, and they do it frequently. This game should be a rout if UGA holds onto the ball. But as you said, nothing has gone as planned this year.

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  6. Scorpio Jones, III

    I have never really understood picking hats for a bowl game, especially in a different year. Whaddaya do? Not that I have done very well in the hat picking deal this year, but if I pick a bad one again is that bad news for next year, too?

    Bowl hats are always a problem.

    Especially since I threw THAT one in Lake Ponchartrain…who knew?

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  7. fatman48

    Anyone would be better Lundquist/Danialson, the best solution is turn the volume off,if you are a fan of the game you don’t need a talking head to tell you what is happening, or volume off and put Scott on the radio, use to do that when Munson was calling the games…

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  8. Will Trane

    Who created the last game turnover for the Dawgs? Is he playing Nebraska. Think JH-C will be missed against the run support. After being idle for a month, will Hutson Mason be in sync and can the other O players run the offense in an up-tempo style that he prefers. And can they sustain it for 4 qtrs?

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  9. DawgPhan

    Do some of you really get that worked up over who is calling the game on TV?

    I did notice that someone calling the Michigan game said that Borges was being very creative to get the ball to a WR. I believe it was a WR screen and then I thought of the guy at MGoBlog losing his mind over Borges and it made me laugh. But seriously twitter is way more interesting than the guys on TV when it comes to CFB in game commentary, but I dont lose my mind over the guy calling the game.

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  10. DawgPhan

    Also I have watched games with lots of people and I have never seen someone turn off the sound on the TV and listen to the radio, though I know that everyone says that they do it. I have never seen it happen IRL. Is this sort of the football analog to people saying they were at Woodstock?

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    • Dude, when Munson called the games we never listened to the TV guys. We enjoyed hearing what was going on before actually seeing it on cable. Guess you have to go back to the old days when the games were rarely on TV. No game day, no twenty games on Saturday.

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      • AmericusDawg

        I bet I have listened to Larry call more UGA games on the radio than I’ve seen on TV. Maybe that’s because I’m old … or that I lived most of my adult life in Raleigh NC (where they thought college football was second to college basketball). Now, being back in my hometown, I get to enjoy watching the games with my aging Father. He hates all the commercials, though!

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    • Debby Balcer

      I have tried but there is no GA station I can get in Greenville I have watched with the volume muted.

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    • My youngest is a senior at UGa and he has watched a game with the sound down and Munson on the radio… more than once. 😉 I wasn’t at Woodstock but I was at the Byron Pop Festival or the Atlanta International Pop Festival. Depends on what t shirt you were wearing I suppose. I also took my kids to a The Who concert when they were in middle school. We didn’t get home till the wee hours in the morning and they went to school that day. My brother in law thought that was very poor parenting on my part. Told me so… more than once. LOL. Wife and kids loved it though. Both my sons got into UGA … his didn’t.;-) Yikes! My bride better not see this!

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    • Gravidy

      I used to do it all the time when Munson was alive. I haven’t since Howard took over. The biggest problem is the timing difference between the TV broadcast and the radio broadcast. The radio broadcast is typically ahead of the TV broadcast. If it is only a couple of seconds, I can live with it. But sometimes it was several seconds ahead. The play would be over on the radio before the TV broadcast would catch up. That’s hard to watch.

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  11. I’d like to think that this will be a game where everybody manages to stay the hell out of Todd Gurley’s way and let him tote Georgia to a win…

    Me, too.

    It’s interesting because these teams are a lot alike in that neither team has a history of being solid, and for that reason they lose a lot of games.

    More so for Georgia though, IMO, because they only way I see Georgia losing this game is somehow giving it away. Not sure that’s true about Nebraska.

    Up until this year, I would be concerned about Georgia showing up. But I don’t think that’s a a problem with these kids (who are, FWIW, the best thing about this season, IMO). These kids have shown they are different than what we’ve had – in attitude, desire, heart, all those good things.

    I think they’ll show up to play. So, we’ll see how good we are in the little things, and if we can keep mistakes to a minimum.
    ~~~

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