ATHENS, Ga. - This is not the first week in Georgia football history in which the Bulldogs are coming off a loss or even a lopsided loss.
Yet the past few days have been accompanied by a "What just happened?" feel, given that Georgia fell behind Ole Miss 45-0 last Saturday before a pair of cosmetic touchdowns resulted in a 45-14 final. The Bulldogs had not given up the first 45 points of any game since a 48-0 loss at Georgia Tech in 1943.
"That feeling is there, but we can't let it affect us," Georgia junior safety Aaron Davis said. "If we overreact to last week, that might throw off a lot of different things as far as our morale and mentality. We just have to have a consistent mentality every week so that we can bring our best regardless of what happens the week before."
Georgia will look to bounce back from last week's debacle on Saturday afternoon, when the No. 25 Bulldogs (3-1, 1-1 Southeastern Conference) host No. 11 Tennessee (4-0, 1-0). The Volunteers are coming off an emotional 38-28 comeback victory over Florida in Neyland Stadium and will be the first road favorites inside Sanford Stadium since 2011, when South Carolina won a 45-42 thriller behind the running of Marcus Lattimore and a late sack by Jadeveon Clowney.
First-year Bulldogs head coach Kirby Smart said this week that it was important to review the Ole Miss game for learning opportunities but that it was important to move on from it quickly as well.
"The silver lining is you get another opportunity to play a good team this week," Smart said. "The opportunity that we have looking forward is what we're fired up about. The best thing we can do is look forward and continue to develop our players to get better. My end goal is for each guy to play his best game in this game. That's what we want.
"The areas we are deficient in - how do we improve them? That's what we're focused on this week."
This is the 11th consecutive year in which Georgia has lost at least one game by 15 points or more. Alabama applied a 38-10 humbling last season inside Sanford Stadium, while Florida has taken the past two meetings in Jacksonville by 38-20 and 27-3 scores.
In each of the past two years, the Bulldogs have managed to recover somewhat from those onslaughts and post 10-win seasons.
"I think we can bounce back for sure," senior running back Brendan Douglas said. "In my senior year of high school, Georgia lost at South Carolina and got blown out (35-7 in 2012), and Georgia wound up winning the East. You never know, so you have to keep working and keep chopping and do the best you can."
Though the Bulldogs have been mediocre three straight weeks - surviving Nicholls State (26-24) and Missouri (28-27) before their trip to Oxford - their outlook for the season would be enhanced greatly by an upset of the Vols. A Georgia win would give the Bulldogs the head-to-head tiebreaker over the East's preseason favorites, but a loss would leave them 0-2 in league play for the first time since their 6-7 season in 2010.
Smart has not had to preach this week on the importance of this game.
"I think they know that, but that's not what they need to be focused on," Smart said. "These guys have to be focused on playing better, tackling better, striking people, taking on blocks and blocking people. We've got so many things we've got to get better at, which is why we had the bad loss.
"You can't just convince yourself to play good in your head. You have to practice physical and do the things right that we're not doing right, and that's what we are focused on. Right now, we're a football team on the brink because we didn't play real good in these last three games."
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6524.