Georgia punter job up for grabs as Drew Miller, Bulldogs compete to replace Brett Thorson
The injury to Carson Beck and his absence from the College Football Playoffs has made the most headlines, but he’s not the only Bulldog that’ll be sidelined. Georgia punter Brett Thorson suffered a season-ending injury as well in the SEC Championship, undergoing knee surgery on his non-kicking leg, leaving UGA to turn to somebody who has yet to punt in their collegiate career.
There are options, Kirby Smart says. True freshman Drew Miller would be considered the favorite. He was the No. 1 punter in the Class of 2024 coming out of Mediapolis High School in Iowa. As a senior, Miller helped lead his team to an 8-2 record and an appearance in the state quarterfinals. Now, the College Football Playoff quarterfinals could be when he makes his collegiate debut.
“Yeah, that’s a day-to-day competition, to be honest with you,” Smart told reporters on Monday. “I mean, we get a lot of guys reps, the guys that punt, and we’ll decide, you know, probably closer to the game as we finalize that, but that’s been, you know, going on since we started back.”
Asked who those “guys that punt” are and how Miller in particular has been doing, Smart shared interesting information. It’s not only specialists that have gotten a look, but also skill players too.
“Drew’s been great. He’s done a good job. He’s taken the majority of those reps, but when the job’s open we let everybody punt. So we’ve got them all out there punting,” Smart said. “You know, Gunner can punt, Puglisi can punt. We’ve got some wide receivers that can punt. I’ve had to punt a couple times, so we’ll just keep going until we run out of punters.”
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Odds are, it’ll be Miller that gets the nod, and there’s reason to be confident in him. He received a five-star ranking from Kohl’s kicking service and even won the field goal competition at the 2021 Kohl’s National Invitational Scholarship Camp. In 30 kicks at the 2022 invitational camp session, Miller averaged 44.2 yards per punt with a hang time of 4.52 seconds. Multiple of his attempts had hang-times were over 4.7 seconds.
“We think he’s really talented, and he does a great job, and he’s worked really hard to get the opportunity, and he punts every day in practice and does a tremendous job,” Smart said of Miller on separation occasion after Thorson’s injury. “He’s a very highly recruited kid who we’ve got a lot of confidence in.”
Of course Georgia hopes Miller doesn’t have to see much action in the Sugar Bowl or beyond. Three times this season did the Bulldogs punt just once or not at all. It’s big shoes however to fill for Thorson, a Ray Guy Award finalist, who punted 42 times on the season for a total of 1,998 yards, averaging 47.57 yards per punt. Just five of those 42 have gone into the end zone for touchbacks with 22 being downed inside the 20.
Georgia takes on Notre Dame New Year’s Day for a spot in the College Football Playoff semifinal on January 9th. The winner between the Bulldogs and Fighting Irish will advance to play the winner of Boise State-Penn State in the Orange Bowl. Kickoff time from the Superdome in New Orleans is set for 8:45 p.m. ET on ESPN/ABC.
