Georgia Head Coach Kirby Smart
On being back at home and playing at noon in Sanford Stadium...
“It’s great to be back here. We played a tough opponent. We talked all week and told our team that we thought this
was going to be the best team we had played and it came out to be that way. They played really tough. They have a
really good quarterback, good system, and they are tenacious on defense. I thought we did really well on offense and
had a great game plan. The kids practiced hard. We didn’t cash in the chips in the red area, a couple really costly
penalties that killed drives. Thank goodness for Jack Podlesny, he just kept on making them and the defense had some
timely stops.”
On the offensive performance...
“Turnovers. Three of them, maybe four total when you count the fake punt, that was like a turnover, they got an extra
possession. It makes it hard. When you come out ahead like we did sometimes you take wins like that for granted. I have a lot of respect for that team and that program. That was a tough, hard-fought win.”
On the defensive performance...
“First of all, they’re physical. They have an athletic quarterback. There are times in games you play, where you say, “Oh we got a good call on that” and everywhere where we had a pretty good call, they had a run/pass option (RPO) where they could bang it in there. When they bang a seven-yard slant instead of handing it off, I’m saying I would have rather them hand it off and try to stop them up there. They did a nice job, they had some explosive plays and we didn’t stop them on those explosive plays. If you take the explosive plays out, we played pretty good defense.”
#13 Stetson Bennett | Sr. | QB
On the start of the game ...
“They’re a good football team. I don’t know if we were awake to start, it was a noon kick. I thought we had a great week
of practice. I thought we had a good walkthrough before, but for one reason or another. And give them credit, they have
a bunch of seniors and they’re a good football team. But an interception, fumble, a dropped punt, you just can’t have
those.”
On if they played to the standard of Georgia football...
“You can’t turn the ball over three times. We didn't punt, not once. We had over 500 yards of offense; scored 39 points.
We had a good day. We just had three turnovers almost consecutively - boom, boom, boom - all in the first half. You
can’t have that, but we still scored [26] in the first half. And they’re a good team. Like I said earlier, I don’t know what
you guys said about how good they were or what, but they’re good.”
#19 Brock Bowers | So. | TE
On being a part of the run game...
“It’s always fun to get the ball wherever you get it. I think just coming out of the backfield, you can just see more stuff
and do your thing more. I like it."
On the team taking an early lead in the first minute of the game...
“We knew they were a good football team coming into it. It’s never really over, especially that early, so we were just
always prepared and just tried to carry on through the game with that same momentum.”
#10 Jamon Dumas-Johnson | So. | LB
On what Kent State did to stay in the game...
“We had some mismatches, some miscommunication, things like that on the field. We just have to clean that up, talk to
each other and have better communication.”