Kirby Smart reacts to Nick Saban serving Georgia ‘rat poison’: ‘I get it’
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On last week’s College GameDay from Iowa City, ESPN analyst and former Alabama Crimson Tide head coach Nick Saban declared the Georgia Bulldogs the team to beat in college football.
“I think Georgia is the most complete team that I’ve seen this entire season,” Saban said on Saturday. “Gunner Stockton’s playing very well. They can run the football. They’ve got a stable of running backs. They make you defend the perimeter with all those screens and advantage throws. They can throw the ball down the field, so they make a lot of explosive plays. And they have one of the best defenses in the country. … They’re doing a lot of things you have to do to win.
“Kirby told me at the beginning of the season, this is the first time in the last few years he’s had enough depth on the team to practice the way he wants to practice. And I see that physical element of the way Georgia loves to play showing up in the way they’re playing this year so far.”
The Bulldogs followed up Saban’s comments with a dominant 38-14 win over the Vanderbilt Commodores in which they looked every bit as complete as Saban claimed them to be
However, in an appearance on SportsCenter Tuesday, Georgia head coach Kirby Smart, who served as Alabama’s defensive coordinator under Saban from 2007-2015, dismissed his old mentor’s high praise, joking that the Crimson Tide legend was trying to serve the Bulldogs some of his infamous “rat poison” before his team faces Alabama this week.
“It’s a setup,” Smart told ESPN’s Kevin Negandhi. “He knows who we play. He knows he said it a couple weeks out before we go to play Alabama.
“That’s easy to say up there on that stage. It’s hard to earn that kind of accolade as a coach because we’re not what he says right now. That is his version of ‘rat poison.’ That’s fine. I get it.”
Georgia and Alabama are slated to clash on Saturday night on ABC from Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa, with Smart hoping to ruin Saban’s homecoming in the showdown of SEC powerhouses.
The post Kirby Smart reacts to Nick Saban serving Georgia ‘rat poison’: ‘I get it’ appeared first on Awful Announcing.
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