Despite lost shutout, Georgia's defense dominates Georgia Tech

ATLANTA -- Georgia was almost one fourth-and-7 stop from handing rival Georgia Tech its first shutout since 1997.

The almost isn't because Georgia didn't make the stop. The Bulldogs never got the chance.

Late in the fourth quarter on a third-and-7 play, Georgia Tech quarterback Justin Thomas threw an incomplete pass to the sideline that would have set the Yellow Jackets up for a long fourth-down conversion. After the play, Georgia senior inside linebacker Jake Ganus was flagged for an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty that set Georgia Tech up with a new set of downs.

While the penalty was one the Georgia coaching staff didn't agree with, more of the shock came because of the recipient of the penalty.

"All he did was, was he was saying it was incomplete because the guy was bobbling it, didn't say a word," defensive coordinator Jeremy Pruitt said. "I've got two sons, I hope they both grow up to be like Jake Ganus. It's surprising that he got an unsportsmanlike conduct. I'd like to see a fourth-and-8 there, see if we could've shut them out."

Georgia Tech scored two plays later for its only points of the game. Although the shutout didn't come to fruition, it doesn't spoil the stellar day the defense had as a unit.

"The offense, it can get a little difficult at times, but I feel like we did pretty good, played aggressive, played with toughness, and then we came out, and we started pounding them from the jump," freshman linebacker Natrez Patrick.

Georgia succeeded as a unit on multiple fronts. Maybe the most important was stopping the fullback dive, a play that the Yellow Jackets used last year to gash Georgia in a win.

"When we set our goals at the beginning of the week, the first thing we had was to stop the fullback," Pruitt said. "Obviously last year, we didn't."

"We just manned up up front," senior defensive lineman James DeLoach said. "We knew that the dive was a big part of their offense. We felt like if we stopped the dive, we stopped their offense."

By doing that, the Bulldogs forced Georgia Tech to deviate from one of the most successful aspects of its game plan. The Yellow Jackets threw 18 passes, the fourth-most passes of any game this season, and was held to fewer than 200 rushing yards for the fifth time this season. Their seven points also were the fewest they have had in a game this season, with the next fewest being 21.

While most of Georgia Tech's success came on runs to the outside, the Georgia defense didn't allow those big plays to turn into points.

"(Georgia Tech head coach Paul) Johnson does such a great job getting you in one-on-one situations. He gets the ball out on the perimeter; it really puts a lot of stress on the defense, and they're going to make plays on you," Pruitt said. "You've got to regroup, you've got to play the next play, and our guys done a great job of doing that (Saturday)."

Georgia was able to overcome many of those big plays by forcing turnovers, which included two interceptions and a fumble recovery. The rest of the dominance came on third down, with the Georgia defense allowing just two conversions in 13 attempts.

"I know they averaged 31 coming into it, so they're going to make plays," Pruitt said. "We tried to stress to our guys, 'They're going to make plays. We've got to get them on the ground, make them snap it again and just kind of keep them hemmed up.' You can call it bend but don't break. I'm just calling it surviving until the next game."

This story was originally published November 28, 2015 at 5:59 PM with the headline "Despite lost shutout, Georgia's defense dominates Georgia Tech ."