How big is UGA’s uber-anticipated opener against Clemson? It’s all in your perspective

At the first mention of Georgia’s opener against Clemson, ESPN play-by-play announcer Tom Hart referenced the Tour de France. He quickly noticed that not many credentialed members walking through the Wynfrey Hotel’s ballrooms for SEC Media Days didn’t know too much about sport across the French countryside.

That might’ve been why Mississippi State head coach Mike Leach’s recall of the term “coup d’état” didn’t register well with too many, either. Nonetheless, Hart made a connection to the story that shook the cycling world, albeit temporarily, in late June when discussing the Bulldogs’ opener.

Wait, what?

A spectator of the race, who held a large sign that read “ALLEZ OPI-OMI !” and translated to “Go Grandma and Grandpa,” interfered with the race at the end of the first stage. Her actions caused a massive crash that made headline news as everything felt dismantled — bike frames bent, equipment destroyed and injuries to cyclists with a bit of gore involved.

The logic of such an incident suggests that the race’s landscape would’ve been massively shaken. Twenty stages, however, remained.

“It had no impact on the race at all. The guy who won the Tour de France, was going to win no matter what,” Hart said. “The Tour de France was long enough to where they had enough time to recover.”

A 90-minute drive separates Georgia and Clemson with Lake Hartwell and a few rural spots of Interstate 85 separate the two powerhouse football universities. The programs will face off on Sept. 4 in Charlotte for the first time since 2014, when Georgia prevailed in the opener at Sanford Stadium. There are many who want an annual rivalry between the teams, and it launches a stretch of 19 premier non-conference games for Georgia over a 13-year span.

A palpable anticipation bleeds among the Bulldogs’ fan base. It’s the biggest season-opening contest for Georgia since 2016 against North Carolina and 2017 at Notre Dame (week two). SEC Network analyst Greg McElroy called the game “enormous” in a brief conversation with The Telegraph due to the talent on the field and the potential advantage for Georgia with players returning.

But, in that same breath, a different view of the heavily hyped contest has a twist to either result:

▪ What if Georgia’s opener had to be the Tour de France’s crash? Or ...

▪ What if the Bulldogs crossed the first stage’s finish line without interruption?

“The first game (against Clemson) can be what you want it to be. You can use it as a springboard and a learning experience,” Georgia head coach Kirby Smart said through his rotations at SEC Media Days. “The outcome is probably going to dictate how you use that game. Neither team will be in or out of the playoffs based off of that one game. It’s a lot more important what you do and how you manage the success or failure from that game.

“We try to look at it as what did you do well or do poorly — regardless of the outcome. The scoreboard only matters to you guys. For us it’s going to be, if we play really well, how can we improve? We’re very technical about the next step, not emotional that it’s over or won.”

Georgia’s approach to the game is much like it was against North Carolina and against both of the home-on-home contests against Notre Dame. The Bulldogs want to respond to the noise that surrounds a game of great magnitude, don’t get that twisted. Georgia isn’t going into the Clemson game saying, “Who cares if we don’t win?”

Smart, however, wants to eliminate emotion. It mimics his repeated coachspeak of not “getting too high or too low,” because the college football season has returned to a 12-game marathon with the ultimate goal of returning to the College Football Playoff. Georgia’s remaining 11 games on the schedule feature three rebuilding programs in the SEC East — South Carolina, Tennessee and Vanderbilt — and its permanent rival, Auburn, is in the first season under head coach Bryan Harsin.

The Bulldogs’ biggest monster on their schedule comes to open the season. Seven of the remaining 11 games are inside Sanford Stadium against none of the powerhouses. There aren’t any massive tests that fall in the middle of the slate like facing top-ranked Alabama on the road in 2020.

“I don’t think that game matters, in the grand scheme of things. It will have far less impact than if it were the final game,” said Hart, who believes Georgia’s next test comes in the SEC title game in December. “Every other game on Georgia’s schedule is winnable. You could make the point from a Georgia perspective, while nobody wants a loss, could use it to keep their edge for the entire season, that Kirby could put the hammer down and say, ‘We can’t slip up.’ ”

Other than Clemson, there’s a sense of curiosity where Georgia gets its next test. The most valid and obvious answer is Florida, especially after the Bulldogs dropped the contest in Jacksonville last season. Maybe it’s the school from Conference USA, however, who comes to Sanford Stadium after a 6-3 season in 2020.

One of the most-glaring results early in Smart’s tenure came after the North Carolina victory. The Bulldogs welcomed FCS foe Nicholls State, who finished with a 5-6 record in 2016, and won by two points. A similar letdown, especially given Georgia’s immense growth and stockpile of talent, would sound the sirens more than any defeat to Clemson.

“That next game against UAB is the most important,” former Georgia tight end and new SEC Network analyst Ben Watson told The Telegraph. “It’s not an SEC opponent. It’s not a huge, nationally-televised game. It’s about how Georgia responds to the success of winning a big game against Clemson emotionally and having the maturity to practice that week and have a decisive win against UAB. Or, if they don’t beat Clemson, the emotion is going to be building for months, how do you deal with that in the next week?

“You don’t want to mull around for a half of football and make a few plays late to win. A dominant performance will tell us as much about Georgia as it did a week before against Clemson.”

Fewer than 50 days remain until Georgia starts its Tour de France. Everyone inside the Bulldogs’ locker room, however, understands that plenty of stages remain after the first one.

“As much as we get hyped for it, because it’s Georgia-Clemson, it’s a Week 1 game,” quarterback JT Daniels said. “You can win Week 1, you can beat Clemson by 100 and have a terrible season, you could lose to Clemson by 100 and have a great rest of the season.”

Georgia Bulldogs 2021 football schedule

• Sept. 4: vs Clemson @ Charlotte, 7:30 pm (ABC)
• Sept. 11: vs UAB, 3:30 pm (ESPN2)
• Sept. 18: vs South Carolina, 7 pm (ESPN)
• Sept. 25: at Vanderbilt
• Oct. 2: vs Arkansas
• Oct. 9: at Auburn
• Oct. 16: vs Kentucky
• Oct. 30: vs Florida @ Jacksonville, 3:30 pm (CBS)
• Nov. 6: vs Missouri
• Nov. 13: at Tennessee
• Nov. 20: vs Charleston Southern
• Nov. 27: at Georgia Tech

This story was originally published July 24, 2021 at 9:05 AM.