Sharing keys to beating Georgia in 2023

There are a couple ways to beat Georgia in 2023, but those teams have to be picture-perfect in order to do so, according to On3’s J.D. PicKell.

Having a balanced approach on offense against Georgia’s stout defense is one way to do it. The name of the game is ball control, as in a successful run game to make the game shorter.

If an opposing offensive line and running back can get through the front seven, it’ll set up that team for success against Georgia.

“You got to have some kind of success in the run game,” PicKell said on The Hard Count. “Now you don’t live in the trenches, you don’t make it a game where you play three yards in the cloud against Georgia because that’s just beating your head against the wall and eventually Georgia is gonna figure that out. But you do it enough to where you earn the right to be one on one on the outside. 

“Meaning those safeties, they can’t just sit back and play over the top and be safety-help for the deep pass. If you’re able to get something on the ground, if you’re able to create something with the power game or inside zone, game, whatever it is just enough to keep them honest. Just enough to keep them honest. That’s one piece of this.”

Simply put, there’s a lot of scheme work to be done. PicKell pointed out how Tennessee prepared for the Bulldogs, despite losing the game.

“The other way to do it is you scheme it up,” PicKell said. “Now Tennessee did this and Georgia dared him to do it, quite frankly. I mean, Georgia has played man covered and said we like our guys better than your guys. But that’s the other thing you can do in modern college football, without getting too in the weeds, the hashes are set up to where you can line somebody way the heck out near the sideline. And just by nature of what humans are capable of doing, you can’t cover all 53.3 yards of width.

“So you have one guy all the way out there with not as much space to work with when it comes to the sideline, but he’s got the rest of the field to try and win. So you got to win one-on-one. going back to that winning one-on-one. You can kind of scheme it up to a degree and you got to make your shot when it’s open. If you win your one-on-one, you got to make sure you capitalize on it.”

However, it’s still unknown who can do it. The two-time national champions don’t appear to have a loss on paper looking at the schedule.

“But that’s another way that you can try to get this done against Georgia,” PicKell said. “So who could it be? That’s really the whole question.”