Sugar Bowl Not So Sweet For Georgia as They Lose 28-21 to Texas

Texas upset Georgia in the Sugar Bowl on Tuesday 28-21. The Bulldogs felt they should have been in the college football playoffs and not the Sugar Bowl, and it seemed to show in their performance in New Orleans as they played perhaps their worst game of the season.

Said Georgia head coach Kirby Smart:”They played more physical than us, and it showed to me that they wanted it more than we did.”
That was pretty obvious.
So did Georgia have a hangover from missing out on the playoffs?
Said Smart:”That would be an easy excuse to use. I’m not touching that. It has nothing to do. We had an opponent.to play. A good football team in which our team was focused on and ready to play.”
Reporter:”Do you feel like you guys were able to flush away the loss in Atlanta before even coming here?”
Said Georgia quarterback Jake Fromm:”You know we flushed it. We went back to work. We realized what had got us to this point, and that’s going to work. That’s grinding.”
It sure didn’t look like a grinding Georgia team.
From taking a knee on a punt snap, to the unexplained two fumbles by D’Andre Swift.
Said Smart:”You think about this year. We didn’t have a start of a game similar to like that really all year.”
Reporter:”What do you think happened to D’Andre at the beginning of the game. Was it just. I have not seen him fumble like that.”
Said Smart:”It happens guys. I don’t know. You want to say that he was wanting to fumble. One of them the guy literally stripped it out. It was a great strip.”
Besides the strips, the Texas defense also held Georgia to 72 yards rushing.
Said Texas head coach Tom Herman:”We knew we had to stop the run. I do. And we were committed to pressuring on first and second down.”
Fromm:”They were slanting this way and that way. Shooting multiple gaps. We just had a tough time trying to figure out which way they’re moving.”
Texas quarterback Sam Ehlinger nearly out-rushed Georgia by himself, running for 64 yards with three rushing touchdowns.
Said Georgia defensive lineman Jonathan Ledbetter:”We didn’t contain. We didn’t have a level pass rush most of the times. We didn’t get him on the ground. When you don’t do that, he makes plays.”
Said Herman:”I’m looking at this stat. The one that sticks out to me. We had the ball for twelve minutes in the fourth quarter. 12 of the 15 minutes.”
Texas bull mascot Bevo charging Georgia Bulldog mascot UGA before the game turned out to be the metaphor for the evening..
Said Smart:”We’ve got to learn from that fact that when you go to play a game thirty days later, you’ve got to be at your best. And we didn’t play our best game tonight, but you’ve got to give Texas a lot of credit because they made it that way.”