Photo by Adam Wynn
When the clock hit zeros, with Brice Young on the ground and the weight of a dreadful drought lifted off our shoulders, my own emotions could be summed up in one word: numb.
The Georgia Bulldogs had finally ascended to the mountaintop in my lifetime. My beloved alma mater was hoisting the trophy, putting to bed any snarky mentions of “1980” or “41 years!” all in one grand motion. And yet, in my heart, I felt nothing.
Don’t get me wrong. When I was ringing the Chapel Bell a few hours later after standing in the frigid air with my family for more than an hour, my heart was full. My hands were numb by that point, but my heart was full.
See, the whole week leading up to the 2021-22 National Championship Game was nothing but terror for me. Most of it was this frustrating sense of pending doom and “Here we go again.”
The University of Georgia Bulldogs had lost seven straight games to the powerful Crimson Tide of Alabama, including a national title shot at the tail end of the 2017 season and an SEC championship about a month prior.
The less said of that game the better.
If you follow statistics, you know that the theoretical odds of winning a game with two participants is 50/50. So you’d think that a seven-game losing streak would end eventually. Surely we couldn’t find another historically heart-wrenching way to lose to the Tide. Right?
Everyone’s second-favorite curly-headed Athenian. I’m obviously Number One. (Photo Used With Permission)
Fast forward to the fourth quarter of the National Championship game. We have a slim lead until an incomplete pass is inexplicably called a fumble and Bama gets the ball in the red zone. The Heisman-winning quarterback gets his only touchdown of the night and we trail 18-13. Not the most common football score by any stretch, but one that was certainly about to find a loathsome place in our trophy case alongside the likes of “2nd-and-26” or the dreaded “28-3” from another red and black football team.
Then the unthinkable happened. Then…Stetson Bennett happened.
Perhaps I’m being dramatic and buying into the hype of “Big Game Bennett” a little bit, but let’s give the man his due. The geriatric quarterback went 3-for-3 and 68 yards, including a 40-yard strike to A.D. Mitchell for the go-ahead touchdown, up 19-18.
So we had a lead. So what? Bama could easily drive down the field and kick a field goal to take the lead back. They wouldn’t even have to go all that far. Just get to about the 35-yard line or so, right? Even with their history of kickers, I just knew they would find a way to break our hearts.
But they didn’t.
One of the best defenses in college football history pushed the Tide back two yards and forced a punt.
Then the Dawgs drove 62 yards in seven plays, capped off by Bennett’s 15-yard touchdown to the Wine Country Wonder, Brock Bowers. The only problem? It was still a one-score game.
Bama trailed 26-18 with 3:33 to play, and they were driving down the field at a decent pace. In my mind, I could see it happening. I just knew Young was going to hit a long touchdown with less than a minute to play, and Bama would tie the game up on a 2-point play. I just knew it was going to happen. I even knew the play it was going to happen on.
UGA defensive back Javon Bullard hoists the Defensive MVP trophy after Georgia’s “Midnight Miracle” win over Ohio State in the Peach Bowl. Bullard was responsible for three solo tackles, one tackle for a loss, and a sack in the Peach Bowl. (Photo Used With Permission)
There was less than a minute remaining when Young stepped back in the pocket and heaved a deep shot to the 21-yard line. The ball was in the air for what felt like an eternity when it came down and landed perfectly in someone’s hands. In my mind, I saw that man turning up field and scoring. And he did.
But it wasn’t for Bama.
When Kelee Ringo ran that interception back 79 yards, the game was over. Bama was never going to score twice in 50 or so seconds to win that game, but I couldn’t let myself believe.
I was so terrified of having another one of “those” moments that I failed to enjoy the finale of perhaps the most consequential football game in UGA’s history.
But this time?
This time feels different.
I’m not scared at all going into this game. Not because I think we are above TCU or that I think we’re invincible. And it’s not that I wouldn’t be upset if we lost.
What’s different this time is that the pressure is off. The Bulldogs are the defending champs. We’re 14-0 with a chance to stretch our program record win streak to 17 games with back-to-back national titles.
As the degenerates in Vegas might say, we’re playing with house money.
The National Championship is a big deal. I am not denying that. And I want to win.
But this time? I feel like I can actually enjoy it.
It helps that I don’t hate TCU. I was honestly rooting for the Horned Frogs most of the season. I’m genuinely happy for their program to have gotten this far and had this much success, even if I hope that their Cinderella story ends here.
Pictured: Sonny Dykes and Max Duggan. (Image Property of Warner Brothers)
And even if we lost to TCU, it wouldn’t be like losing to Bama…again. It wouldn’t be like watching Nick Saban do his awkward T-Rex dance with the team afterwards. Seeing the wrong shade of red falling down around Nick Chubb and Sony Michel in 2017 was a truly haunting image. Seeing it happen again to Stetson Bennett and Jordan Davis and Bowers and Mitchell and the rest of that storied team would have been too much to bear.
If purple and white confetti litters the field in SoFi Stadium Monday night, I’ll be bummed. I’ll be upset that we missed out on this chance to make history and perhaps even eclipse USC’s epic winning streak from the early 2000s. But I won’t be as broken as I would have been had we not won last year.
As I told someone online a month or so ago regarding the 2017 championship loss, a national title heals a lot of wounds. Sure, we know there should have been another trophy in that case already, but it’s a little bit more okay now.
So maybe I’m not as stressed as I was a year ago. Maybe I’m not quite as nervous. This time, my first feeling is excitement.
I’m ready for the game. I’m ready to watch the Dawgs take the field in those home red jerseys as the top-seeded team in the College Football Playoff. I’m ready to see if Bennett can cement his legacy as the greatest quarterback in UGA history. I’m ready to see if this “new breed of Bulldog” in Kendall Milton and Kenny McIntosh and Daijun Edwards and so many others are ready to run rough-shod over the TCU defense, just like their historic Georgia forebears. I’m ready to see if we can defend this title and become the first back-to-back CFP winners.
It’s rare that the heart of a team is a player who isn’t even on the field, but I believe that Nolan Smith’s leadership from the sidelines has been crucial to this Bulldog team getting as far as they have. (Photo Used With Permission)
Most of all, I’m ready to sit back and actually enjoy the National Championship game. I’ll probably be a nervous wreck once toe meets leather, and I doubt I’ll actually breathe a sigh of relief until the game is over or we lead 49-0. That’s just who I am.
But no matter what, I’m ready for this one. And if we manage to pull it off and the red confetti falls to the turf, the same turf where Georgia quarterback Matthew Stafford lifted the Lombardi a year ago, then I’ll be ready to sit back and smile.
Because our Bulldogs are National Champs. Again.
NOTE: So all of my Peach Bowl photos are used with permission of credentialed media, but I have been instructed to not credit the photographer. I know that sounds weird, but that’s what I’ve been instructed to do. It kills me to do that because I firmly believe in crediting photographers and journalists when possible, but them’s the breaks.