Georgia: Dogs brace for LSU noise

ATHENS, Ga. — It was supposed to be the silencer.

With LSU leading Georgia 10-3 during their 2003 matchup in Baton Rouge and the visiting Bulldogs hemmed on their own 7-yard line with 4:25 to play, David Greene threw a first-and-18 screen pass to Tyson Browning. The play caught the blitzing Tigers completely off guard, and Browning raced 93 yards down the sideline for the tying touchdown.

“I was expecting a hush from the crowd,” Georgia coach Mark Richt recalled this week, “but all I began to hear was a chant. ‘L-S-U! L-S-U!’ It got louder and louder and louder, and it was the loudest I’ve ever heard a stadium.”

The Tigers, like so many times before and so many times since, fed off their fans and answered Georgia’s score with a six-play drive that culminated with a 34-yard touchdown toss from Matt Mauck to Skyler Green with 1:22 remaining. Richt had opened his Georgia career by winning nine straight games in opponents’ stadiums — including triumphs at Tennessee, Alabama, Auburn and Clemson — so the 17-10 loss at LSU would be his first such setback.

Richt is now 27-4 in foes’ homes entering Saturday’s second opportunity inside Tiger Stadium.

“It’s a place that I can truthfully say has been the loudest place I’ve ever been,” Richt said.

After the forgettable 1990s that included seven losing seasons, LSU has become a national power like never before, winning two of the past five BCS national championships and three of the last seven Southeastern Conference titles. Included in the recent run, which started with Nick Saban and has continued under Les Miles, has been the re-establishing of Tiger Stadium as the nation’s most imposing venue.

Legendary Alabama coach Paul “Bear” Bryant once labeled Tiger Stadium “the worst place in the world for a visiting team. It’s like being inside a drum.”

LSU is 52-7 at home this decade, and there is no longer much of a difference between catching the Tigers under the sun or under the lights. They are 41-4 at night, which continues to be the preference for the home folks, and 11-3 in afternoon starts.

Saturday’s game has an afternoon start on CBS, just like the ’03 matchup did.

“The only thing I can think of that was close to that was the Swamp when we played Florida when I was at Miami,” Bulldogs defensive coordinator Willie Martinez said. “The thing you’re concerned about the most when you go on the road and play in an atmosphere like this is your young guys, your inexperienced guys, and how they’re going to react. It’s our eighth game, and our guys have been to South Carolina and they’ve been to Arizona State, so they’ve got some experience there.”

Most of the current Bulldogs believe last season’s game at Alabama’s Bryant-Denny Stadium was the loudest road atmosphere they have experienced. Several gave nods to Tennessee’s Neyland Stadium and even the Georgia-Florida game in Jacksonville, which is a 50-50 crowd split.

They were unanimous, however, in their curiosity about this week’s trip.

“I’ve heard it’s very loud and that the fans are crazy,” linebacker Darryl Gamble said. “I think it’s going to be a great challenge for our offense and not so much our defense, because the crowd silences down when their offense is going.”

Said tailback Knowshon Moreno: “I kind of like these games, because I think they help me to focus a little better.”

Georgia offensive line coach Stacy Searels had the same job in Baton Rouge from 2003 to ’06, so he was on the opposite sideline in the ’03 matchup. Richt said this week that Searels told him that game was the loudest he had experienced on LSU’s staff.

Rodney Garner, Georgia’s defensive line coach, was an Auburn offensive lineman in 1988 when Tommy Hodson passed to Eddie Fuller in the back of the end zone to rally LSU to a 7-6 win at Tiger Stadium. The touchdown resulted in such a roar that it registered vibrations on a university seismograph machine.

“The place rocked. You could definitely feel it,” Garner said. “Their fans are pretty animated. It’s probably not a place for wives and kids. You see some different stuff.”

Odds and ends

Richt said Thursday that redshirt freshman guard Chris Little, who is sitting out this season with a broken foot, has decided to transfer at the end of the semester. ... The Bulldogs will hold a rare workout Sunday night and will have Monday off.