Georgia Football: 5 things to watch in 2019 G-Day game

Georgia Football‘s G-Day game brings the conclusion of spring practice in Athens. Here are five things to watch for on Saturday as the Bulldogs take the field.

2019 is a big year for Kirby Smart and Georgia Football. For the third year in a row, the Bulldogs will sport a roster good enough to compete for a national championship. But can they finally finish the job and bring the school’s first national championship since 1980 back to Athens?

The last two years have ended with painful defeats. The 2018 season effectively ended when Georgia surrendered a two-touchdown second half lead to Alabama in the SEC Championship Game. The team we saw in the Sugar Bowl was unmotivated and clearly unprepared to play. The sting of the stunning loss to the Crimson Tide and narrowly missing a second straight trip to the playoff clearly affected the team leading up matchup with Texas in New Orleans.

The 2017 season ended even more painfully, and in the same building, as Georgia surrendered a two-touchdown second half lead to Alabama and watched a then-unheralded freshman named Tua Tagovailoa dash their hopes with a 41-yard touchdown pass in overtime to rip the national title out of its grasp.

It’s been a tumultuous offseason for the Bulldogs, with a rash of transfers and players declaring early for the draft. If that wasn’t enough, six Georgia players have been arrested over the last couple of months.

The off-the-field issues have only furthered the comparisons to former head coach Mark Richt, who, like Smart, won a lot of games, but could never break through and win the national title. The clock isn’t yet ticking on Smart, but a few more close calls and failures on the big stage will crank up the pressure on him moving forward.

I don’t want to be too negative, though, because Georgia has once again brought in a loaded recruiting class, with several talented youngsters already standing out during the spring, and getting ready to shine in their first opportunity at G-Day. The Bulldogs will undoubtedly be a national championship contender once again, and their march to a third straight SEC East title begins on Saturday.

Here’s five things to watch during G-Day: