Forde-Yard Dash: Georgia-Alabama Rivalry Adds Next Chapter After Nick Saban’s Retirement

Bulldogs coach Kirby Smart won only one game against the Crimson Tide, but now takes the mantle as the game’s greatest active coach.

Georgia coach Kirby Smart needs to turn around his record against Alabama. / Joshua L. Jones / USA TODAY NETWORK

Forty names, games, teams and minutiae making news in college football, where the Pac-12 power play has not gone entirely according to plan. First Quarter: Twelve Angry Men. Second Quarter: Group of 5 Realignment Struggle. Third Quarter: Unbeaten Challenges.

Fourth Quarter: Georgia-Alabama, the Post-Saban Era 

Now it gets real for Kalen DeBoer (31). Now he really has to start trying to measure up to the incomparable legacy of Nick Saban, when the No. 4 Alabama Crimson Tide (32) host the No. 2 Georgia Bulldogs (33) in the biggest game of the season to date.

Saban set the Alabama bar impossibly high in an array of areas, most importantly winning six national championships between 2009–20. But not far down the list from that is his ownership of Georgia. He went 8–2 as coach of the Crimson Tide against the Bulldogs, and even more significantly was 5–1 against Kirby Smart (34).

Smart has assumed the mantle of the game’s greatest active coach. But that would have happened earlier if not for a repeated inability to beat his mentor and former boss, Saban. 

Put it this way: Kelee Ringo (35) is the only thing separating Georgia from a complete nightmare existence where Alabama is involved. The defensive back’s pick-six of Bryce Young late in the 2021 College Football Playoff national championship game drove a stake through Bama, cementing a Georgia national championship and Smart’s only victory over Saban.

The Bulldogs needed that desperately. Before and after that cathartic moment, there were the following red-and-black tales of woe:

• The 2017 CFP championship game, when Georgia could not hold a 13-point lead in the final 21 minutes of regulation. Out of answers in the second half, Saban benched Jalen Hurts and semi-desperately turned to a freshman backup quarterback named Tua Tagovailoa, who threw a second-and-26 touchdown bomb to a freshman named DeVonta Smith for a walk-off national title. It remains the single biggest thunderclap moment in CFP history.

• The 2018 SEC championship game, when Saban again went to a backup quarterback but in reverse for another comeback victory. This time, it was Hurts replacing the injured Tagovailoa. This time it was Hurts leading the rally from 14 points down, with a CFP bid on the line. Smart aided and abetted the winning drive with a fourth-and-11 fake punt call from midfield, with the snap going to a freshman upback/quarterback named Justin Fields. Five plays after that disastrous decision, Hurts ran in with the winning score.

• The 2020 regular-season meeting in Tuscaloosa, when Mac Jones led a second-half strafing of Georgia, 41–24. At the time that felt like another catastrophic development for the Dogs, but in retrospect that was a juggernaut Alabama team that went on to win the national title—Saban’s last—unimpeded.

• The 2021 SEC championship game, in which an underdog Alabama wounded seemingly invincible Georgia with another 41–24 win. While the Bulldogs would get their revenge in the title game, that upset induced 37 days of severe anxiety for a fan base that was utterly tired of losing to Saban.

• The 2023 SEC championship game, perhaps Georgia’s most bitter loss to Bama since the ’17 natty. This was a winner-gets-in-the-playoff, loser-leaves-town showdown and the undefeated Dogs were solidly favored. But after a quick 7–0 lead, everything started to unravel on Georgia and favor Alabama. This was one of those Smart-vs.-Saban moments when Kirby looked like he was seeing ghosts, his team pressing while the Tide was executing. Alabama went on to lose in overtime to eventual national champion Michigan; if the Dogs had gotten in, could the end result have been a Georgia three-peat?

Georgia’s record from 2017 to the present is an overpowering 90–10. Exactly half of those losses were inflicted by Nick Saban (36). Which means nobody was happier to hear Saban’s retirement announcement than Smart. 

And it means that DeBoer has quite the task to live up to. When beating Georgia is an expectation, not a wishful dream scenario, you’ve got a hard job. 

Line: Georgia by 2, per DraftKings, the first time Alabama has been a home underdog since 2007—Saban’s first season. 

Key stat: Since Carson Beck (37) lost a fumble that led to a Bama field goal in an SEC title game decided by three points, Georgia has not turned the ball over again. The Bulldogs were spotless in the Orange Bowl rout of the Florida State Seminoles last season, and they are one of three teams yet to commit a turnover this season. They haven’t lost a game in which they didn’t commit a turnover since that 2018 loss to … Alabama. (Though the fake punt was a de facto turnover.) 

Dash pick: Georgia 23, Alabama 20. The hunch here is that Smart prevails upon offensive coordinator Mike Bobo to let Beck cook a bit more earlier in the game than he has so far, with positive results. The other hunch is that Smart doesn’t suffer a fainting spell without Saban on the other sideline.

Coach Who Earned His Comp Car This Week 

Curt Cignetti (38), Indiana Hoosiers. The last time the Hoosiers looked like this was … never? They’re 4–0, which has happened a handful of times in school history, but they’ve never scored this many points (202, or 50.5 per game) in their first four games. The first-year coach arrived from the James Madison Dukes talking noise—a bold strategy at Indiana—and to date his team has backed him up. The Hoosiers haven’t played anyone good yet, but at this juncture Cignetti is the Hire of the Year in college football.

Coach Who Should Take the Bus to Work 

Hugh Freeze (39), Auburn Tigers. Oh, it’s getting ugly early on The Plains. Freeze threw his players under the bus after a loss to the Arkansas Razorbacks dropped the Tigers to 2–2 and ran their turnover total to a nation-leading 14: “We’ve got to find a guy that won’t throw it to the other team and we’ve got to find running backs that hold on to it,” he said. “... The scheme is what most everybody in the country is running, some sort of. But you’ve got to have a good quarterback in whatever system you’re going to choose.” 

That prompted a bitter social-media broadside from one of Freeze’s best quarterbacks, Bo Wallace, who played for him at Mississippi a decade ago. He savaged Freeze for what he says is a history of throwing his players under the bus after losses. When one of your best former players is going after you like that publicly, that’s a bad sign.

Point After 

The Dash stayed in town last week but that’s no excuse for not finding a high-quality regional beer. When thirsty in the Midwest/Mid-South area, grab a Hoppopotamus IPA from Indianapolis-based Metazoa Brewing Co. (40) and thank The Dash later.

Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.

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