The case for Georgia as Top-2 team, national title contender despite difficult schedule

The Georgia Bulldogs fell short of the four-team College Football Playoff and repeating as national champions for a third season in a row in 2023. Now, they’re looking to get back to the Playoff and compete for a title again.

To get there, Georgia faces a difficult schedule. Still, as he explained during an episode of Andy Staples On3, Jesse Simonton argued for the Bulldogs to be a Top-2 team and a national title contender, starting with what they’re putting on the field on the defensive end.

“Can they reload? The offensive line is not a problem at Georgia,” Simonton said. “They’re stacked there. I think the defensive line is gonna be better. A year ago, they regressed a little bit. That’s natural. You lose Jalen Carter, you sent five guys or whatever to the NFL Draft in the first round over the last couple of years. You’re gonna regress a little bit. So, I think the run defense, which was around 20th in the country, it should be better. Those linebackers that I talked about earlier, [Damon] Wilson, [CJ] Allen, Jalon Walker is gonna become just a household kind of name as a Swiss Army pass rusher, inside-outside guy.”

That talent extends to the offensive side of the ball. There, Jesse Simonton argued that Georgia is among the best teams in the country.

“Then, offensively, Georgia has very quietly assembled a kind of elite group of playmakers. Now, I don’t think it’s as good as Ohio State‘s or maybe even Oregon‘s, but it rivals just about everybody else. You get the veteran tight end to supplement Oscar Delp from Stanford. You bring in Colbie Young from Miami who is now kind of your big weapon, Javon Wims type of ball winner. Then you bring back Dillon Bell and some of these other guys like Arian Smith,” Simonton continued.

Despite all of that talent, the reality is the schedule is going to be very difficult for Georgia, with regular season games against Clemson, Texas, Alabama, Ole Miss, and Tennessee among others on its schedule this season. However, the expanding Playoff should help Georgia to still compete at the end of the year.

“They’re gonna be really good. So, that game against Clemson Week 1 is gonna be fun,” Simonton said. “Their schedule, to your point, is much tougher, but how do you kind of relay that right here. I think fans also have to get used to the fact that we’re not gonna see undefeated teams all that much anymore, and so if you lose a game in the regular season, it’s no longer the end all.”

At that point, Andy Staples jumped in to say that Georgia is likely going to have rematches in the SEC Championship Game or the College Football Playoff. That’s a change for college football fans that they’ll now have to come to accept.