Nick Saban stresses ball security for Carson Beck in the SEC Championship

While not having had the season that some thought, Carson Beck can still help Georgia to win the SEC Championship.

Ahead of kickoff in Atlanta tomorrow, Nick Saban spoke about Beck while on ‘Pat McAfee Show’.

“Well, I think Carson Beck is a really good quarterback,” Saban said inside Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Friday.

Again, Beck’s season hasn’t been his best at times with 65.1% completion for 3,429 yards, 28 touchdowns, and 12 interceptions. The passing scores are a career-best but those other statistics are all down from last season, especially with the dozen picks being double what he had last fall and more than half of what he has thrown in his entire collegiate career in Athens.

Still, Saban says there’s more that goes into that than just how Beck himself plays.

“You’ve heard me say this a hundred times before. The players around you have to play well. He’s had a lot of drops. He forced some balls, probably. Receivers don’t separate as well as they did a year ago when he had some better guys, mismatch guys. So he’s had a little more to overcome,” Saban said. “I think he’s had an opportunity, also, to prove that he can do it if he doesn’t have better players around him. So, that, maybe, he didn’t do as well as he could.”

So, with that, Saban says protecting the football will be Beck’s job against Texas in the SEC Championship on Saturday. In each of the five games this season that he has had a turnover, he has had multiple with anywhere from two to four. Two of those were there losses this fall at Alabama and at Ole Miss. That trend, as Saban notes, also goes back to their two conference title losses in 2021 and 2023 against the Crimson Tide, which he coached, as ‘Bama won the turnover margins in those games as well at 3-0.

“I do think, when he hasn’t turned the ball over? You know, Georgia has lost four times. Every time they’ve lost in the last however many years – they lost four games. They’ve lost the turnover battle,” Saban said. “This year, how many turnovers did they have against Alabama? How many did they have against Ole Miss? I mean, it’s the same thing. So taking care of the ball is really important. So, if you can win first and second down, you don’t put as much pressure on the quarterback on third down to take care of the ball.”

Georgia already beat the Longhorns by double-digits earlier this season with Beck throwing three picks in Austin. Be better than that and the ‘Dawgs could very well earn themselves a conference title and playoff bye tomorrow in The ATL.