My take on the UGA/USC game

I've been collecting my thoughts about the game last night and all I can say is... What a great game! The best one I have attended in quite a long while. We are a good team that played great at times yesterday and showed our youth at others. I loved the fire that coach Richt showed -- especially right before halftime hen he chased the officials to the locker room. Mike Bobo has more young, talented players than he knows what to do with. It was easy to call the offense when it was Stafford throwing and Knowshon running. There was no choice of who, it was just a question of what and how. Now he has go to figure out how to manage our young talent. He did better this week than last, but he has still got some work to do.

There are going to be a lot of folks angry with Willie Martinez after this game because -- well they have to be angry at someone, right? But they should take a big step back. Willie called a pretty good game, all things considered. The pass rush wasn't bad, but there were at least a half-dozen times were the rusher would spin the wrong direction or just miss bringing down Stephen Garcia, who played out of his friggin mind. Willie was completely hamstrung by having his top defensive end, Rod Battle, go down with a knee injury and two of his top three Sam linebackers, Darius Dewberry and Nick Williams, miss the game with hamstring pulls. Marcus Washington spent most of the game floating between LB and DE, and Willie was essentially just working with what he had. The middle of the field was open a lot, but it was by necessity. He played a classic bend-but-don't-break style, which was not pretty, but it was effective. The defense was exceptional in the red zone, and South Carolina didn't score an offensive touchdown in the second half. Our Defense was on the field 30 MORE PLAYS than their defense in this game. This was not anywhere near as bad as some people are going to make it out to be. Our coaching is not perfect, and like it or not... this IS a rebuilding year. That doesn't mean we can't (or won't) win some games. But this season is all about getting some key young talent ready for what should be a nasty run towards excellence. We will be a force in the SEC again when we mature as a team, Urban Meyer goes to Notre Dame, and Tim Tebow goes to the CFL (or Hell). In the mean time... It is good to be 1-0 in the SEC! Bring on that Arkansas and Petrino (AKA: Benedict Arnold, Brutus, Judas, etc). Let's go get a little better this week and end up 2-0 in the league!

respectfully submitted,