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Kirby Smart gives Loran Smith all credit for making 2021 National Title book possible

On3 imageby:Jake Rowe•05/08/23•

JakeMRowe

Loren Smith
Georgia head coach Kirby Smart, Georgia Athletics Historian Loran Smith after the 2022 College Football Playoff National Championship against Alabama at Lucas Oil Field in Indianapolis, Ind., on Monday, Jan. 10, 2022. (Photo by Tony Walsh)

A pair of Georgia legends recently teamed up to put together something ever Bulldog fan is going to want. Two-time National Championship-winning (and counting?) head coach Kirby Smart and long-time UGA mainstay Loran Smith have written a book entitled “How ‘Bout Them Dawgs!: The Inside Story of Georgia Football’s 2021 National Championship Season.”

Putting something like that together is a massive undertaking. Smart knew that when Smith approached him about it after the confetti fell on the Lucas Oil Stadium turf in January of 2022.

That’s why the always-busy leader of the Georgia was, at best, reluctant to acquiesce. But in an interview with 680 The Fan on Monday from the David Pollack Family Foundation Golf Tournament at The Georgia Club, Smart revealed that Smith had answers for all of his questions.

“I’ll be honest with you, he (Smith) had to twist my arm, break my arm, pull my arm to get me to do it,” Smart said when asked about the book. “I feel like I owed it the UGA people. I’m not a book writer. I’m not even an avid book reader. I’d rather get it on some kind of way, podcast, and listen to the book rather than read it but I tell you, when Loren came to me and said, ‘it’s been 41 years. I think it’ll be special. I think it’ll give an inside look.’ I said, ‘Loren, how much time is it going to take. I don’t have any time.’ He said, ‘I’ll travel with you. I’ll go with you.’So I had speaking engagements all over the country last year. I flew to Texas. Loren flew with me and got to go on the plane. So I feel like the time was utilized the right way in spending time with him and doing recordings.”

According to Smart, his perspective is far from the only one shared. The book, which retails for $39.99 in its hardback form on Amazon.com, features stories from a number of different individuals involved in the title run.

In fact, the eighth-year head coach praised Smith for how hard he worked at getting different voices in the book. So many people had a hand in winning the 2021 National Championship and Smith was able to loop many of them in.

Smith also had the foresight to capture as many moments possible during the 2021 College Football Playoff. He got Smart’s permission to deploy a photographer as the Bulldogs went to Miami for the Orange Bowl and Indianapolis for the National Championship game.

Smart wasn’t all-in on that idea from the beginning either. He joked with the 680 crew that he was concerned about his team possibly being jinxed by the move. But, as we all know now, the Dawgs finished that season — and the next — on top.

“He kept a lot of it without me even knowing and I think when you talk about the stories leading up to the game and throughout the National Championship run, everybody was involved,” Smart said. “He included everyone and it gives that view from the inside out how we went about things. it even digs into my family and my background there so I think it’s cool and Loren did a great job with it as well as all the people who helped.”

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