Kirby Smart provides injury update on Lawson Luckie

Georgia freshman tight end Lawson Luckie will be sidelined for at least a few weeks with an ankle injury. Just how many, though? Head coach Kirby Smart can’t say.

Luckie went down with an ankle injury in the first Georgia scrimmage on Aug. 10, but the exact nature isn’t clear. However, Smart said players have come back from similar injuries in as few as three weeks or as many as six.

“We’ve had Arian [Smith] — came back in three, four weeks from a similar injury. But we’ve had guys take five weeks, we’ve had guys take six weeks, so I can’t tell you that. I don’t know,” Smart said of Luckie’s timeline to return.

Smart does know what factors are at play, though, and it’s a matter of Luckie having a tolerance for whatever pain he might play through and, mainly, him completing his rehab from doctors and trainers.

“It’ll be how he handles and the pain tolerance and the recovery. But we’re gonna run and the medical staff’s going to do the best job they can to get him back,” Smart said.

Overall, it seems Luckie will be back at some point in the 2023 season, perhaps just a few weeks into the year or close to the mid-point of the season.

One thing is certain about his return right now: Smart has no idea when it’ll happen.

“It’s week-to-week. I won’t know exactly what it is,” Smart said.

Smart was already high on Luckie by the Georgia spring game

Doing an on-field interview in the second half with ESPN’s Alyssa Lang, Smart noted that Luckie enrolled in December and joined the Bulldogs for practices during the College Football Playoff, giving him a notable leg up.

“He’s one of the toughest guys I’ve been around, as far as playing football. He does a really good job on that. So it’s fun to be around him. I’ll tell you, he’s a kid that took advantage of, he didn’t go play in all these all-star games. He just said, ‘I’ll stay here and practice with the Georgia Bulldogs.’ So he had 15 to 20 practices of semifinals, and the finals game that he practiced with our team. So he’s so much further ahead,” Smart said.

Luckie is a Georgia legacy — his father played for the Bulldogs — and was a four-star tight end prospect in the 2023 signing class according to the On3 Industry Ranking. He was the No. 8 tight end in the class and joins a Georgia tight ends room chock full of talent. Though he’s not likely to unseat Brock Bowers as the starter, Luckie might be on pace to compete with the likes of Oscar Delp to be the backup.