Walter Geiger
Geiger’s Counter: The best weekend of the year
It is time for Labor Day weekend, the best weekend of the year in my estimation because it combines the opening of dove season and the college football season. All over the South, hunters will be perched on dove stools in the field listening to their favorite team on the radio.
Preseason is when the spirits among fans run high and optimism is at its peak. Perfect seasons and title runs are dreamed of and contemplated. Often those dreams turn to nightmares before the September page is torn off the calendar and deposited in the trash.
So, what can we expect from the two local college teams, Georgia and Georgia Tech, this season?
We will start with Georgia Tech. The Jackets begin the season unranked.Their only mention in any of the polls was one vote in the USA Today coaches’ ranking.
There is much talk that teams have enough film on Tech coach Paul Johnson’s option attack and have schemes in place to stop it. Tech has no passing game to speak of so, if you stop the run, you have stopped the Jackets - or so the thinking goes.
FSU is the highest ranked ACC team at fifth in one poll and sixth in another. Tech, however, dodges the Noles who are not on the schedule. Tech gets Virginia Tech, which is ranked in the top 15, at home.
Tech hosts North Carolina and travels to Miami but both those teams face NCAA-mandated implosions. Indeed, the Canes may be fielding a scout team by the time they face Tech on October 22.
So, the guess here is Tech posts wins over Western Carolina, MTSU, Kansas, Maryland, Virginia and Duke and loses to North Carolina, N.C. State, Virginia Tech and Georgia with the Miami game as a tossup. That would leave the Jackets 7-4 or 6-5 and in a mid-tier bowl matchup.
As for the Bulldogs over in Athens, there seems to be a serious sense of urgency to right the red and black ship. Much of this has to do with the hot seat flames that are focused on Mark Richt’s rear end.
Much has been said about new attitudes and a new strength and conditioning program. We shall see. The fact is the Dogs have played flat in big games for the past four years under Richt and the season begins with two huge games.
If the Dogs are flat Saturday night in the Dome against Boise State, they will get waxed by the fifth-ranked Broncos. I don’t see that happening and foresee Georgia winning the game by 10.
The following week brings Steve Spurrier and the Gamecocks to Athens for a major clash. I see that game as too close to call. Write this down, if Richt goes 0-2 in those first two games, he is done at UGA.
So the prediction here is Georgia defeats Boise State, Coastal Carolina, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Tennessee, Vanderbilt, New Mexico State, Auburn, Kentucky and Georgia Tech but loses to Florida (gotta prove to me they can win in Jacksonville) with South Carolina a tossup.
Richt finishes 11-1 or 10-2 with a possible appearance in the SEC title game, thus saving his bacon.
Of course, this is all guesswork. The proof will be in the pudding and we can start sampling it this weekend.
Enjoy it. It will be over all too soon!
Walter Geiger is editor and publisher of The Herald Gazette and Pike County Journal Reporter.
So, what can we expect from the two local college teams, Georgia and Georgia Tech, this season?
We will start with Georgia Tech. The Jackets begin the season unranked.Their only mention in any of the polls was one vote in the USA Today coaches’ ranking.
There is much talk that teams have enough film on Tech coach Paul Johnson’s option attack and have schemes in place to stop it. Tech has no passing game to speak of so, if you stop the run, you have stopped the Jackets - or so the thinking goes.
FSU is the highest ranked ACC team at fifth in one poll and sixth in another. Tech, however, dodges the Noles who are not on the schedule. Tech gets Virginia Tech, which is ranked in the top 15, at home.
Tech hosts North Carolina and travels to Miami but both those teams face NCAA-mandated implosions. Indeed, the Canes may be fielding a scout team by the time they face Tech on October 22.
So, the guess here is Tech posts wins over Western Carolina, MTSU, Kansas, Maryland, Virginia and Duke and loses to North Carolina, N.C. State, Virginia Tech and Georgia with the Miami game as a tossup. That would leave the Jackets 7-4 or 6-5 and in a mid-tier bowl matchup.
As for the Bulldogs over in Athens, there seems to be a serious sense of urgency to right the red and black ship. Much of this has to do with the hot seat flames that are focused on Mark Richt’s rear end.
Much has been said about new attitudes and a new strength and conditioning program. We shall see. The fact is the Dogs have played flat in big games for the past four years under Richt and the season begins with two huge games.
If the Dogs are flat Saturday night in the Dome against Boise State, they will get waxed by the fifth-ranked Broncos. I don’t see that happening and foresee Georgia winning the game by 10.
The following week brings Steve Spurrier and the Gamecocks to Athens for a major clash. I see that game as too close to call. Write this down, if Richt goes 0-2 in those first two games, he is done at UGA.
So the prediction here is Georgia defeats Boise State, Coastal Carolina, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Tennessee, Vanderbilt, New Mexico State, Auburn, Kentucky and Georgia Tech but loses to Florida (gotta prove to me they can win in Jacksonville) with South Carolina a tossup.
Richt finishes 11-1 or 10-2 with a possible appearance in the SEC title game, thus saving his bacon.
Of course, this is all guesswork. The proof will be in the pudding and we can start sampling it this weekend.
Enjoy it. It will be over all too soon!
Walter Geiger is editor and publisher of The Herald Gazette and Pike County Journal Reporter.
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