Nolan Smith likely out for rest of 2022 season
Georgia, ranked No. 1 in the nation per the AP and coaches polls, will likely be without senior outside linebacker Nolan Smith against No. 2 Tennessee this Saturday. It’s looking like that might be the case for at least the rest of the 2022 regular season.
DawgsHQ has learned that Nolan Smith will have surgery to repair a torn pectoral muscle on Thursday. Matt Zenitz of On3Sports is reporting the same regarding Smith’s prognosis. The Savannah native suffered the injury in the first half of Georgia’s 42-20 win over Florida on Saturday.
The Bulldogs had gotten quite a bit from Nolan Smith before his injury. He had two solo tackles, one for loss, and a quarterback hurry halfway through the second quarter of that Florida game.
Georgia’s defense responded well to Smith’s absence at first but started to give way some in the final two quarters. Florida gained 283 of its 371 yards in the second half. The Gators also scored 17 points in the third and fourth quarters but 10 of those game off Bulldog turnovers.
Nolan Smith is Georgia’s leader in sacks and tackles for loss. He has three sacks and seven stops behind the line of scrimmage to go with 16 total tackles, a pass breakup, and numerous quarterback hurries. A season ago Smith was one of two Bulldogs to piled up double-digit tackles for loss. He had 10.
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Smith had 3.5 sacks last season but two of those came in the post season. He had one each in Georgia’s College Football Playoff matchups with Michigan and Alabama. The one against Alabama was the last play of the National Championship game.
Smart told reporters last week that Nolan Smith is more than just a productive edge player for the Bulldogs. He has a larger role within the team.
“Leadership, toughness,” Smart said of Smith. “Nolan is a natural leader. He’s been that way since I met him when he was in eighth grade and he came up here to camp. He’s been a natural leader, comes from a great family, but his leadership is more important than his ability and his ability is pretty strong. He creates a toughness about the he holds people to a standard of the way you strike blocks, the way you close on counters, the way you rush with effort, special teams, I mean, he plays on all special teams. He’s just a core guy.”
Georgia’s showdown with Tennessee is set for a 3:30 p.m. ET kickoff on Saturday. CBS is televising the game as its SEC Game of the Week. ESPN’s College Game Day will be in Athens on Saturday along with The SEC Network’s SEC Nation show. The Bulldogs opened as a 12.5-point favorite according to VegasInsider.com. That line is now down to 8.5 points.
