Georgia Football: Four Lessons Learned from UGA’s Victory

Pass Rush is Better Than Expected, Run Defense Worse Than expected

Pass Rush

The talk going into the game concerning the Georgia Bulldogs defense, was that the pass rush bad been anemic. It’s been well stated that the Georgia football team prides themselves on stopping the run as a priority.

The game against Missouri was a “Twilight Zone”, as the Bulldogs generated a much better pass rush than expected, yet had trouble stopping interior runs. Edge rusher D’Andre Walker was a terror on Saturday. His two sacks were double the Dawgs total on the season.

D’Andre Walker also had a quarterback hurry and was constantly getting close to Drew Lock. He batted down a pass, as did freshman Brenton Cox. Cox was also a disruptive force rushing the passer.

UGA defensive coordinator Mel Tucker also uncharacteristically dialed up a few well-timed blitzes. UGA is know more for applying pressure with their front four. Linebackers Juwon Taylor and Kenyon Richardson each recorded quarterback hurries on blitzes.

The showing by the pass rush, and the team being willing to dial-up a few blitzes when necessary, is a very encouraging sign for the defense moving forward. The Dawgs need to build on that performance, and continue to develop young pass rushers opposite of D’Andre Walker.

Run Defense

Uncharacteristically for a Georgia football team, the Dawgs gave up 172 yards on the ground. They allowed Missouri to match their 4.6 yards per carry, which is an extremely rare occurrence. It was especially troubling, that most of the successful runs were directly up the middle.

Moving forward

Georgia football’s opponents will certainly try to duplicate the success Missouri had running the ball. Personally I’m not too concerned about it. The reason why, is because most of the damage Missouri did running was against double high safety looks, due to a respect for Drew Lock.

The great thing moving forward is the Georgia Bulldogs won’t face very many quarterbacks, if any, the caliber of Drew Lock for the rest of this season. This will allow defensive coordinator Mel Tucker to use more single high safety looks to neutralize the opponent’s run game.

The one quarterback that Georgia will definitely face that could duplicate the Mizzou’s strategy, is Auburn. Jarrett Stidham, the Tiger’s quarterback is an NFL prospect, though he’s not as highly rated as Drew Lock. Stidham is a capable passer who must be respected.

When the Georgia Bulldogs face the Auburn Tigers, look for Auburn to test the Bulldogs single high safety looks downfield early. They will attempt to force UGA to leave both safeties back, in order to exploit the run game.

Should Auburn be successful at forcing UGA into a cover two shell, linemen Julian Rochester, Tyler Clark and Jonathan Ledbetter must be stronger at the point of attack.

The Dawgs could add more beef up front by replacing the 269 pound Ledbetter with a bigger player such as Notre Dame transfer Jay Hayes, who weighs 289 pounds. Junior nose tackle Michael Barnett, who tips the scales at 292 pounds, would also be a candidate to beef up the defensive line.

The safeties JR Reed and Richard Lecount will be key in helping the line against the run. As will inside linebackers Monty Rice, Natrez Patrick, Juwon Taylor and Tae Crowder. Maintaining proper gap discipline will be essential.

Outside linebackers Walter Grant, D’Andre Walker and Brenton Cox, will be asked to maintain the edge. They last thing UGA wants to do, is compromise the edge in order to shore up the middle. Particularly against Auburn that uses a variety or jet sweeps, screens, and read option plays to threaten the edge of a defense.