Scott Cochran no longer with Georgia football program

Georgia Bulldogs special teams coordinator Scott Cochran is reportedly no longer with the program.

“Georgia has a spot to fill on its off-field coaching staff. DawgsHQ has confirmed that Scott Cochran is no longer with the UGA program. The news was first reported by UGASports.com. DawgsHQ is unable to confirm details on his departure,” wrote Jake Rowe of DawgsHQ. “Cochran has been with the Georgia program since the 2020 season. He was the Bulldogs’ special teams coach for the 2020 season but left the program temporarily prior to the 2021 season to deal with some personal issues.

“Will Muschamp, who was hired as a senior analyst at Georgia after the 2020 season, stepped into Cochran’s on-field coaching role and helped out with both special teams and the UGA defense as the Bulldogs went on a National Championship run.”

The original report on the matter came from Anthony Dasher of UGASports. Continuing, Cochran has stepped away from the team for lengthy amounts to time to deal with personal issues in the past, but Kirby Smart’s belief in his friend and longtime assistant never wavered. Regardless, it seems as if his time with the Bulldogs has ended.

More details are sure to come to light, but at the moment the one thing being reported is that Cochran is no longer a member of the coaching staff in Athens. We’ll see where the story goes next.

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Moreover, Cochran originally stepped away from his position temporarily to deal with personal issues prior to Georgia’s 2021 national title run. Then, in July of 2022, months after returning to Athens from his absence, the longtime friend and co-worker of Smart revealed his battle with addiction in the past, sharing he was at the time one year sober.

At the following SEC Media Days, Kirby Smart reaffirmed his commitment to helping Scott Cochran through his personal issues as a member of the Georgia staff. While it weighed heavily on him and the players, knowing that his well-being was put first became most important.

“We commit to having conversations,” said Smart. “And the commitment to Scott (Cochran) was that he’s committed to our program and getting better. You look at what he’s done with our players, I don’t think you’d find – we have a lot of exceptional people in our organization, Jonas Jennings, Brian Gant, Scott Sinclair, I could go on forever – but Scott Cochran spends a tremendous amount of time with our players on a personal level. And they value the relationship that he creates with them. He spends time with them, meaningful time with them.

“I think a lot of our players saw the human side with Scott, and that we all know addiction is real. It probably affected me as the leader of the organization for the first time to have someone on your staff be involved with that. And I got a lot of help from outside sources on how to do it.”

Evidently, Kirby Smart holds Scott Cochran in high regard, but his time with the Bulldogs has seemingly ended ahead of the 2024 campaign.