The Georgia Bulldogs blew a golden opportunity to beat the Ole Miss Rebels in the Sugar Bowl . Georgia had the ball down by three with less than two minutes remaining. The Dawgs were in field goal range and had an opportunity to run down the clock.
Georgia ideally would have scored a touchdown to force the Rebels to have to score a late touchdown. At worst, the Bulldogs could run a play that kept the clock running and left Ole Miss with around 20 seconds left in the game.
Instead, Georgia threw an incomplete pass and settled for a field goal. Ole Miss took possession with under a minute left and capitalized. The Rebels knocked through a game-winning field goal with less than 10 seconds left in the game.
Georgia coach Kirby Smart explained after the game that Georgia was going for the win and did not want to run the ball from the six with 1:04 left on the clock. He thought Georgia's best chance to win was with a pass.
"The last third down, do you mean before the field goal?" Georgia coach Kirby Smart asked after the game. "We wanted to score a touchdown. I think we were on the 3 or 4. We wanted to score to win. The book says, go win the game. We talked about it in between. I thought by calling a timeout, run it, they don't have timeouts, ease the clock down.
"Playing for a tie doing that, right? And I just don't believe in playing for a tie. Had to go for tie because we didn't complete it.
"But we knew we were going to leave time on the clock. We felt like defensively we were playing well. To be honest with you, it was a two-point play to win the Sugar Bowl, or at least have a chance to win the Sugar Bowl, because they would have got the ball back. But I feel really good about that. I didn't want to run it. We ran it on second thinking we could do it, and they got the look. And Gunner (Stockton) did a good job checking that run."
Georgia's red zone offense failed to get the job done a couple of times. The Bulldogs settled for short field goals twice in the second half. Smart's decision to not run down the clock drew significant media criticism.
Georgia was one play away from beating Ole Miss. The Bulldogs have been on the other side of the coin: the 2025 Tennessee game and the Peach Bowl against Ohio State. In both of those contests, opposing kickers missed potential game-winning kicks against Georgia. Ole Miss kicker Lucas Carneiro ended Georgia's luck and nailed his third field goal of the game (he made kicks of 47, 55 and 56 yards) to crush Georgia's national championship dreams.
I don't blame coach Smart for going for the win, but Georgia needed better execution and probably wishes it didn't lose three yards on a slow developing second down run from the 3-yard line.
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This article originally appeared on UGA Wire: Media critical of costly Kirby Smart Sugar Bowl decision
