Why the Georgia Bulldogs Will Own the Florida Gators Starting in 2009

Despite the blowout, this is a rivalry. I live in south Florida and am surrounded by the enemy. They HAD to win, and they did. Otherwise, there is huge criticism in Gainesville. I really felt Florida had more pressure on them, yet we are the ones that choked.

Okay, “predicting” an 80-90 success rate against Georgia over the next ten years is probably not defensible except by gut feeling. Let’s face it, there’s a massive amount of data here, chaos reigns supreme, things change year in and out. No one knows what will happen. Mark Richt could become a cross-dresser and be mistaken for Helen Hunt even more frequently. Urban Meyer could join the Peace Corps and start snipping Nigerian orphans’ private parts in the name of God. Florida could have a string of outstanding recruiting classes that win a string of SEC titles and a few more BCS titles as well. Georgia could find a superhuman combo of David Pollack, Herschel Walker and David Green, who plays on both sides of the ball and also placekicks.

But to me, basing a prediction of a long streak in the opposite direction because the Dawgs have been enduring one for a time calls for the disclaimer ‘past performance does not guarantee future results." I mean, you could really get ridiculous with this one. Why not predict that because Harvard, Yale, and Princeton dominated from 1909 to 1912 that they won’t do so again every 100 years? Or that Georgia Tech is due to reverse the 8-0 trend against Georgia, winning most of the games in the rivalry for the next decade, despite the clear difference in overall talent?

It just seems absurdly arbitrary to base your prediction on past W-L stats. I’m choosing to go with my belief that Florida will continue to improve under Urban Meyer based on their overall record, their record against Georgia, championships won and recruiting. If Richt is going to start beating Florida regularly, something must change. What will that be?

… I have doubts going into the Georgia game. It is never a foregone conclusion to Gator Nation that we will win. Do we expect to win, yes. Are we free of doubts, no. And that will never change. It’s a rivalry game. It’s the nature of the beast.

And yes, the rivalry is definitely back. Personally speaking, I am pleased that the “Incident” occurred in ‘07. It enraged the fanbase and players, and I am certain it contributed in large part to the 49-10 outcome of this year. I’m still pissed about it, even now, and I expect our players and coaches will be in 2009 and 2010 as well. We’ll be running that tape loop for years to come.

Urban Meyer doesn’t get pissed easily, but the “Incident” ranked up there with some of the worst behavior he’s seen in his career. He won’t forget it, just like Spurrier never forgot Dooley’s center kicking that field goal. It is seared into this rivalry, and it’s of far greater benefit to the Gators than Georgia.

. . . which is why I believe this posting, while somewhat facetious, has more than merely a grain of truth to it.

Most college rivalries are streaky, much more so than most professional sports rivalries. Look at Florida-Florida State; you see long runs of dominance by one team or the other. Sometimes this occurs during periods (such as the present one) in which one team is markedly better than the other, but it also shows up during periods when both teams apparently are equal.

Particularly when you’re dealing with young amateurs rather than more seasoned professionals, emotions can play a critical role. “Momentum” is a tangible thing; it can be felt entering and leaving stadiums; it may be seen over the course of a season and over the course of a game. Nowhere is this more true than in college football.

I believe rivalries are streaky because of the psychology of sports among amateur athletes. From 1990 to 1996, Florida beat Georgia annually because the Gators were more talented and better coached, which is why only two of those seven losses by Georgia were even close. After that, though, Jim Donnan’s and Mark Richt’s recruiting, Mark Richt’s coaching, and Ron Zook’s tenure in Gainesville served to level the playing field.

Georgia still lost regularly, but the evenness of the series was evident on the scoreboard: 20-13 in 2002, 16-13 in 2003, 31-24 in 2004, 14-10 in 2005, 21-14 in 2006. Those are the sorts of scores you see between evenly matched teams.

Now take a look at the Georgia-Georgia Tech rivalry during that same period. The Bulldogs won by scores such as 19-13 in 2004, 14-7 in 2005, and 15-12 in 2006. The Red and Black consistently played close games against two of their three biggest rivals, yet the ’Dawgs dominated one and were dominated by the other in terms of wins and losses. Why?

I believe it is because mindsets become self-fulfilling prophecies when one is dealing with amateur athletes. The wind went out of Georgia’s sails after the first field goal miss in Jacksonville last Saturday. The game remained well within reach at halftime, yet reports indicate that the locker room was listless and lifeless, as though the conclusion were foregone. The attempted on-side kick and the attempts to be overly clever with the red zone play calling were symptoms of a lack of self-confidence.

Georgia does not lack self-confidence against any other team on the schedule, and Georgia has beaten every other team on the schedule more often than not in the Mark Richt era. The Bulldogs believed they could beat Tennessee in Knoxville in 2001, so they could, and did.

I have said for years that, if we win the coin toss in Jacksonville, we should neither defer the kickoff nor choose a particular end zone to defend; rather, we should ask that the Gators put on Tennessee uniforms. If they did that, we’d beat them half the time. The same would hold true for Georgia Tech if they could get the Bulldogs to wear Clemson’s uniforms.

I don’t think there’s anything inherently magical about the 19-year cycles in the rivalry (although you have to admit that it’s a little creepy how reliable the swings have been), but, if the players for both sides believed the 19-year cycles were inevitable, they would become inevitable.

Such is the importance of the difference between stepping onto the field hoping to win and stepping onto the field knowing you’ll win. I mean no disrespect to Urban Meyer, who is an outstanding coach, or to the Gator players, who are talented athletes, when I say that this one factor, more than any other, has made the difference in Jacksonville more often than not.

Well, that, and the way the open dates have fallen, but that’s a separate conversation.

… by teams from Mississippi. The worse they are, the better chance we have of losing to them. It is bizarre in the extreme. No one can explain it.

In fact, I mentioned it right here 20 minutes ago.

In the response linked to above, I wrote: “I believe rivalries are streaky because of the psychology of sports among amateur athletes.”

The part where the word “psychology” was named was the part where I used the word “psychology,” as in: “I believe rivalries are streaky because of the psychology of sports among amateur athletes” (emphasis added).

As evidenced by the wording and context of that sentence, I was writing about “year to year expectation, not a short term emotional response to the coach or coaching style.” Specifically, I was describing how, after several years of actual on-field domination by the Gators (1990-1996), Georgia started losing to Florida due to the psychological expectation of defeat, as evidenced by the string of close losses in the early 21st century.

Clearly, this was not a reference to “a short term emotional response to the coach or coaching style,” since it encompassed a period of almost 20 years’ duration and involved three different coaches on each side of the rivalry.

I also cited the Georgia-Georgia Tech series as an example of the same phenomenon. The Yellow Jackets haven’t beaten the Bulldogs without blown officiating calls and/or fielding multiple academically ineligible athletes since at least 1990, but several recent games between the two have been close, suggesting that mental miscues (particularly by the likes of Reggie Ball) have had an impact.

I think we’re saying the same thing. I just pointed out to you that I said it first. If you’re being an obtuse smart-aleck on purpose, maybe “psychology” isn’t the only P word that applies here.