Georgia falls short of national championship, but a new standard has been set in Athens

ATLANTA — The confetti that scatters the field of Mercedes-Benz Stadium downtown in Georgia’s capital is red and white for the Alabama Crimson Tide. Head coach Nick Saban has just taken home the fifth national title to Tuscaloosa since his arrival in 2007. It’s a remarkable run that looks like it won’t slow down anytime soon.

No, this wasn’t the storybook ending the Georgia Bulldogs had hoped for. They lost the title game in crushing fashion on a touchdown pass from Tua Tagovailoa in overtime to give the Tide the 26-23 victory, effectively letting what would’ve been the first title for the Dawgs since 1980 slip away.

As the confetti rained down and Alabama players celebrated the win, a few Georgia players watched the jubilation take place across the field, coming to peace with the dream season that had just come to an end:

The Dawgs had a 20-7 lead in the third quarter, but some key penalties and miscues ultimately let Alabama come back late. It’s quite the opposite feeling from a week ago. Georgia had won one of the most thrilling College Football Playoff Semifinals in the modern era, with a double-overtime win over Oklahoma in the Rose Bowl. Monday night was almost the same exact situation, but with the opposite result.

Dawg fans greatly outnumbered the Tide fans on hand, even buying 70 percent of the tickets ahead of the matchup. There’s a lot to celebrate for this fan base, which has been rejuvenated as the program has been catapulted back to national relevancy for the first time in years.

Even with the loss, 13-2 is the best finish for Georgia since the 13-1 season in 2002 during Mark Richt’s second year in Athens. The crowd on hand Monday night was about 70/30 Georgia, as expected with the game being in Atlanta. One of the things that struck me was how many UGA fans remained in the stands well after the final whistle — soaking in every second of this season, like they had all year:

It’s not often you see the losing fan base of a team in the national title stay to watch the other team celebrate.

This is the first national title game appearance for Georgia since 1980, and Dawg fans weren’t going to miss any second of it, even after the game was over. The fans even gave the departing Georgia players a loud, audible “U-G-A” chant as they headed into the tunnel for the night:

The postloss locker room was downtrodden, as one would have expected, but there was something in the way the players talked that added a different element to the atmosphere — determination. There was a glimmer of hope in the air that came off as if players were already thinking about next season and getting back to this game.

“Just to let this moment drive us,” Georgia receiver Riley Ridley said of how to move forward. “We had an unbelievable season that we had goals for. This was one of them, and we actually pulled up a little short, but this just has to motivate us; it has to drive us; it has to bring us back next year; it has to be a part of us. It has to have our Tuesdays and our Wednesdays more physical than this year. That’s what we’re going to drive off of: this loss.”

There were some visible tears from some of the seniors who had just played their final game in a Georgia uniform, but the mood from most players I spoke with was one of looking forward, even though the game had ended less than an hour before.

True freshman quarterback Jake Fromm, who started on Monday and finished with 232 yards and a touchdown, preached positivity when asked about coming up short.

“I’m trusting God’s plan,” Fromm said. “It’s definitely not what I want, but at the end of the day you trust in his plan and you go to sleep tonight, put your head on the pillow, and tomorrow’s another day.”

Like Fromm, Ridley further stressed that what the 2017 season as a whole represents is a new era for Georgia football.

“I wouldn’t say just this game, this whole season we played hard,” Ridley said. We played with our hearts. Just this season will change Georgia forever. It’s been a while since we made it this far, and we just came up a little short tonight. But we’ll let this feeling right here drive us.”

The thing is, Georgia is back folks. The way Kirby Smart has things structured in Athens is eerily similar to how it’s done in Tuscaloosa. The former Saban experiment that has failed so many times in the past is up and running at full speed at Georgia, and it’s here to stay.

The way that Alabama has been loaded for years, replacing blue-chip with more star-studded rosters, is where Georgia is now, and Smart is just in his second season. During the 2018 cycle, the Dawgs have the No. 1 class in the land, with 18 blue-chips. Smart put together the No. 3 class in the country last year.

“Everybody respects Georgia now,” Dawg cornerback Deandre Baker said. “Even though we took an L tonight, everybody respects Georgia now.”

Smart couldn’t beat his former mentor, and Saban is now 12-0 against his former assistants. But it’s more than safe to assume we’ll be seeing Georgia in another matchup like this in the near future:

Smart has built Georgia into an Alabama-like national power in a short time. The Bulldogs have the best recruiting class in the country for 2018, a group that currently stands as the sixth-highest-rated class ever signed. They’ve become the clear best team in the East, just as the Tide occupy a similar perch in the West. Though they may not be on each other’s regular-season schedules every year, Saban and Smart will probably see each other again in many postseasons to come.

“In overtime we didn’t finish when we had to and Alabama did,” Smart said postgame. “Give them credit, but I think everybody can see that Georgia’s going to be a force to be reckoned with. I’m very proud of this team and this university, and we’re not going anywhere.”