16-in-16 2025: Georgia Bulldogs
After an up and down 2024 campaign, can Kirby Smart and the Dawgs regain their stranglehold on college football?
By: Hammer
For a refresher on our ratings system, check out our 16-in-16 ratings guide here.
Georgia is a fascinating team heading into 2025. Last season, by Georgia standards, and I really need to emphasize by Georgia standards, was not up to par. The Bulldogs went 10-2, won the SEC title, and secured a first-round bye in the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff before losing to Notre Dame in the quarter finals (with a backup QB making his first career start). But again, that was not up to the Georgia standard under Kirby Smart, especially with how Georgia looked in certain games. As unrealistic as those standards might be, it is fair to say the 2024 Georgia team looked more beatable than they had been in several years. Losing two regular-season games had not occurred since the 2020 season, and one of those losses was a relatively non-competitive 28-10 loss at Ole Miss.
The Georgia defense was slightly more gettable than in recent years, and the offense never really found its footing. Carson Beck dearly missed Brock Bowers and Ladd McConkey in the pass game and was bitten by the turnover bug. The run game never quite got going like you would expect in Athens. Yet, this team still won the SEC and saw 13 players get drafted in the NFL Draft. If that season constitutes a “down” year, then it’s clear your program is one of the very best in the entire country, which is exactly what Georgia is. The Bulldogs remain one of the top programs in the nation, and they don’t take a backseat to anyone in terms of recent on-field success, talent acquisition, investment and coaching staff.
State of the Program: 11/12 biscuits: Elite. Flip between one and two in your conference each year and you aren’t going anywhere. You’re here to stay, like Hardee’s biscuits. Or Popeye’s. Or Bojangles.
This is obvious to me. The only thing holding the Dawgs back from being a 12/12 is not winning a national title since 2023. Yes, that sounds insane to say out loud that two years without a natty is holding any team back. But we pride ourselves on our biscuit rating formula here at Biscuits & SEC, and it’s fair to rate Georgia as an 11/12, especially considering they are not the consensus national title favorite coming into this year. They absolutely could win it, but their death grip on the sport is not as strong as it felt a couple years ago.
In terms of the overall state of the program, on-field success since 2020 is better than anyone in the sport. Two national titles, two conference titles, and five total losses, including postseason play, in four seasons. The Bulldog seniors in 2024 left Athens as the winningest class in school history, posting a 53-5 overall record and an undefeated 25-0 record in Sanford Stadium.
On the talent acquisition side of things, Kirby Smart is elite. Over the last four years, Georgia has landed the #2 overall class three times and notched the #1 class once. They are consistently the best recruiting team in college football right now. Given the elite high school recruiting, the transfer portal rankings are not as flashy, but that is only because the Dawgs are not constantly trying to fill holes in the portal. Being so good at recruiting, retention, and development is a feature, not a bug. That said, Kirby still knows how to use the portal and has landed 17 four and five-star transfers over the last two years.
Investment-wise, just like every other facet of this program, Georgia is right up there with the best. It’s estimated that in 2024, Georgia’s collective, the Classic City Collective doled out over $18 million in NIL payments, good enough for third in the SEC. Sanford Stadium is a fantastic venue and just underwent renovations before the 2024 season. Overall, the Bulldogs facilities are as good as it gets in college football. But in the never-ending arms race of college athletics, even Georgia needs to keep up, which is why they are breaking ground in 2026 on a practice facility upgrade for football, alongside a litany of other upgrades for other sports. To avoid sounding like a broken record, I’ll just say this once more: the Georgia football program takes a backseat to no one in the sport.
What went right in 2024?
Sometimes the fanbases of elite teams get too caught up in how their favorite teams win. Nick Saban and Alabama went through this, and Georgia just went through this in 2024. Many Georgia fans, especially during the grind of the season, didn’t think the team was very good. After coming up for air in January with the season over, it turns out the 2024 Georgia team was pretty damn good. They won 10 games with one of the toughest schedules in the nation, won the SEC championship by defeating Texas for the second time, and were a top-four seed in the inaugural 12-team CFP. Every fan base would sign up for that season in a heartbeat. Losing to Notre Dame in the semifinals with Gunner Stockton making his first career start is not a big deal. Notre Dame was really good, and they showed that by making it all the way to the national championship.
Although the Dawgs defense wasn’t quite as elite as we had grown accustomed to, they still finished 23rd nationally, allowing 20.6 points per game. With the exception of the Alabama and Georgia Tech games, the defense did its job for the most part. The offense struggled with turnovers at times, but in general still found ways to score points, averaging 31.5 ppg. Rather than praising one side of the ball about what went right, I think the more apt thing to highlight is just how good of a team Georgia was last year. When the defense struggled in games like Alabama and Mississippi State, the offense scored 34 and 41 points, respectively. When the offense struggled in games like Kentucky and Texas, the defense stiffened up and only allowed 12 and 15 points, respectively. I understand the sentiment from Dawg fans that they looked sloppy and inconsistent at times. But this team just won games last year. It wasn’t always perfect or pretty, but going 10-2 and winning the SEC championship is a damn good season. The 2024 Georgia team was a testament to how good a head coach Kirby Smart is. They won with grit, toughness, and figured out a way to win the conference without their fastball.
What went wrong in 2024?
As you can tell from the what went right section above, this varied. At times, the offense was the issue. In a six-game stretch from the Alabama game on September 28th to the Ole Miss game on November 9th, Carson Beck threw 12 interceptions. That’s awful. Given how good Beck was in 2023, it was one of the more puzzling storylines of the 2024 season. Clearly, Beck missed his Bowers and McConkey, and the offensive line did not do him any favors either. To further the offensive line struggles, the Dawgs running game never found any consistency. Georgia finished 102nd in the country in rushing yards per game at 124.4. That ain’t Georgia football. The turnovers, lack of run game, and inconsistent weapons on the outside really made Georgia’s offense a game-by-game proposition. You never quite knew what you were going to get.
Similarly, the defense allowed much more running room than we are accustomed to a Kirby Smart Georgia defense giving up. They allowed opponents to rush for 129.6 yards per game, which was 36th in the country. To put it in perspective, Georgia only allowed 77.1 rush yards per game in 2022 and 113.6 in 2023. I know injuries in the front seven played a part in this, but a Dawg defense that prides itself on an elite, physical front seven did not live up to its billing a year ago.
What Georgia needs in 2025
Despite the issues we saw from Georgia in 2024, they still won 10 games and won the SEC. So what do they need in 2025? Not a whole lot, at least compared to most programs. But we know the expectations in Athens, so if they want to be holding a natty trophy at the end of the year, they do need a few things. It begins on the offensive side of the ball. The defense slipped last year and will need to improve in 2025, but the offense is where they need to be more consistent. It starts up front with the offensive line. Georgia has to be able to run the ball, especially with an inexperienced QB in Gunner Stockton. I’m fairly high on Stockton compared to what I have seen other pundits saying, and think he will be a top half of the SEC QB. However, he is inexperienced and is unlikely to be able to shoulder the fate of an entire offense. The Dawgs have to be better at the offensive line, both in pass protection and the run game. Nate Frazier is a good tailback and if he has consistent blocking, there is no reason he can’t push for a 1,000 yard season, even in Georgia’s running by committee approach.
If the Dawgs can protect the QB and run the ball effectively, Stockton should be able to find the upgraded weapons on the outside. Transfer wide receivers Noah Thomas and Zachariah Branch are an upgrade compared to what they had last year. Dillon Bell and Oscar Delp return as well, so the weapons are there to be more explosive in the passing game. Stockton has the ability to make throws; he just needs the time.
How they can earn some extra biscuits
This is quite simple: get back to and win the national title. Could they potentially receive a 12th biscuit even if they don’t manage to win it all? Perhaps, but it’ll be easier on all of us if they just take another trophy back to Athens. Georgia is as good and consistent as any program in the country, and earning the coveted 12th biscuit requires an elite season. I don’t see them losing a biscuit after 2025, but if they want that final, coveted biscuit, they really need to earn it!
Next Up:
Arkansas Razorbacks
Previous:
South Carolina Gamecocks, Alabama Crimson Tide, Auburn Tigers, Florida Gators
