Georgia receiver Terry Godwin has put up similar numbers during his first two college seasons and could benefit this spring from an improved passing game.Georgia set a Southeastern Conference record last spring when 93,000 fans packed Sanford Stadium to watch Kirby Smart’s first G-Day football game as coach of the Bulldogs.
Smart set the theme for last year’s “93K Day” with a plea during halftime of a Bulldogs basketball game, but there was no such message earlier this winter. That does not mean, however, that the second-year mentor does not want another healthy audience on April 22.
“The more we can pack that stadium and make it like a real game, the more I get to find out how kids respond and adapt to that atmosphere,” Smart said last week on his radio show.
The Bulldogs struggled through a 7-5 regular season during Smart’s debut year – losing to Vanderbilt and Georgia Tech in the same year for the first time since 1961 – but they had a fantastic December. Tailbacks Nick Chubb and Sony Michel and outside linebackers Davin Bellamy and Lorenzo Carter announced they would return for their senior seasons, and Georgia notched an eighth triumph with a 31-23 topping of TCU in the Liberty Bowl.
Georgia returns its leading passer, its three leading rushers, five of its top six receivers and 14 of its top 15 tacklers from a season ago, so to say optimism abounds in Athens would be quite the understatement.