MVDs: Kentucky Edition

You don’t leave the frozen food section of Kentucky’s Kroger Field with an SEC win without a total team effort. But even then, some ‘Dawgs are bound to put in a Kroger Plus effort. Those standout players are your MVDs, the Most Valuable ‘Dawgs from Georgia’s 16-6 win over the Kentucky Wildcats.

Offense: Kenny McIntosh. KMac had a career-high 143 yards on 19 Carrie’s, serving as the bell cow on an afternoon during which the plan was clearly to run the darn ball. He also had Georgia’s only touchdown on the day, punching in a 9 yard run to stretch the lead to 16-0.

Defense: Smael Mondon. The sophomore linebacker tallied 11 total tackles, including 4 solo stops, and added a quarterback pressure. It’s been great through this season to watch Mondon playing faster and more confidently. Obviously there’s still a lot of football to play in 2022, but along with Jamon Dumas-Johnson he should give the Red and Black as good an inside linebacking corps as any in the nation in 2023.

Special Teams: Jack Podlesny and Brett Thorson. I couldn’t decide between the two Bulldog kickers. Sure, Hot Pod hit all three of his field goal attempts in the first half, any one of which could have flipped the momentum if he’d missed. But Thorson, after sitting on the sideline for the entire first half, came in and bombed two solid punts. The first went out of bounds at the Wildcat 10 yard line. The second was fair caught at the 10 (although a kick catch interference call on Nyland Green moved it to the 25). Both of these were essentially perfect days.

As always I invite you to drop your own nominees in the comments. Who was your MVD?

Go ‘Dawgs!!!