The Georgia Bulldogs had high hopes at the dawn of this football season with the tailback tandem of Nick Chubb and Sony Michel, three returning starters up front and five-star freshman Jacob Eason at quarterback.
Bulldogs first-year offensive coordinator Jim Chaney didn't assemble those and other pieces to his liking, and he has turned the blame inward.
"I think I would not be telling the truth if I said I wasn't a little disappointed in our production throughout the fall," Chaney said Wednesday in a Liberty Bowl news conference, "and as the play-caller and coordinator, that burden lies with me. I feel obligated to those kids to put them in better positions and score more points, and there were five times this year when we didn't get that done."
Nobody entered Kirby Smart's debut year expecting a 7-5 regular season that would end with a trip to Memphis and Friday's noon EST kickoff against TCU (6-6). Even more unexpected is an offense that ranks 89th nationally in yardage (382.4 per game) and 105th in points (24.0), with each of those totals ranking 11th in the 14-member Southeastern Conference.
Georgia's scoring average is its lowest since the 1998 Bulldogs averaged 23.3 points during their 11-game regular season.
"You always feel like you're failing when those things take place," Chaney said. "There has been a lot of reflection on my part throughout the season and, particularly, after the season in bowl preparation - what we could have done better, and what we should have done better. It will continue through the offseason when Coach Smart and I get a chance to sit down and visit even more about the direction and what we want to do, but I just feel like we could have done a little better, and that starts with me."
The Bulldogs were rarely the same from one week to the next, tallying 326 of their 355 yards against South Carolina on the ground and then 346 of their 421 against Vanderbilt through the air. There isn't much of an identity even now as Georgia's 13th game approaches, with Chaney admitting the strengths of certain players often caused challenges.
"You would love to be a downhill team, but you do have a young quarterback that has played in the gun more, so you have to find some happiness there," Chaney said. "As we worked through that, sometimes it didn't work out as well as we would have liked. There was a little contradiction with philosophies in regards to that as we worked through it."
Said Chubb: "We've got to also realize that he's just calling the plays. We're the ones on the field not executing. It's a little more half-and-half. It's on us, too."
Georgia is playing with its third offensive coordinator and third offensive line coach in as many seasons. The line was expected to be a strength and was dazzling in the opening defeat of North Carolina, but the unit was plagued by inconsistencies the rest of the way.
Eason was erratic at times and Chubb may never be the same back who rushed for more than 2,000 yards during the final eight games of his freshman season and the first five of his sophomore year, but Chaney isn't about to blame others for an attack that was pedestrian at a program that annually put up big numbers not that long ago.
"I'm not going to sit here and point fingers at anybody but myself," Chaney said. "It's my job to coordinate everything and make sure we're scoring more points, and it's a tough pill to swallow when you don't score enough to win games. It falls on me and not our players. Our players have played hard."
Odds and ends
The Bulldogs practiced for two hours Wednesday morning at Rhodes College. Freshman receiver Riley Ridley was spotted on crutches Wednesday at the team hotel. Ridley has 12 catches for 238 yards this season.
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6524.