Thank God we lost that game.

I don't know that I could have stomached us winning that game at the end. Don't get me wrong, I really wanted someone to come down with that ball. I was hoping that this time Marlon Brown might be able to snag a defelected ball, score the winning touchdown and bring us the most inconsequential bowl victory in ages. Still, I wouldn't have wanted to read all the punditry surrounding how UGA finally "pulled out the close one" and how this would "springboard" us into next year. Even if we had pulled that one out in the waning moments, it wouldn't have been an amazing story of overcoming adversity, it would have been a story of us finally getting out of our own way.

That's really all the Liberty Bowl was. Central Florida was giving the Dawgs their absolute best. You could see it on the face of their all-world DE Miller (who didn't garner a scholarship discussion at any SEC schools), and the dawgs were sleep-walking. When the dawgs were granted one final play, the camera was on Miller, and you could read his lips: "I think I've got one more in me." He was ready to collapse. The Dawgs didn't look so expended. Perhaps that's why Miller was able to fly through the line twice in the three plays near our own goalline, once disrupting a run, and the second time putting a huge hit and sack on Aaron Murray. Maybe our line was just "saving their energy" for something. Are the Georgia players better athletes? Yes. Yes they are. There's no other way to explain facing a 10-3 conference champion who gives you their absolute best shot, and still walking away with only a 6-10 defeat. Simply put, even half-assing a game, the Dawgs were in position to win that one.

Now, that shouldn't make me feel particularly good about the game in any way. Murray was just plain off. He was throwing passes he had absolutely no business throwing. He very nearly had a third on the drive where we settled for our second field goal of the day. He tried to hit Orson Charles over the middle, but failed to see the safety tracking the entire play. I don't know how he didn't see the safety....he didn't stray more than two yards from his pre-snap position, and was right in the middle of the field. On another play, he nearly threw it directly to a corner when trying to hit Charles (whose route carried him very close to Green - odd). Murray's first pick looked like a miscommunication with Logan Gray. The second pick was an obvious overthrow of Ealey. But how do you overthrow that ball? Then there was the one he threw into the dirt in front of Durham - and the wobbly duck on 4th down that Durham was able to pull down. Murray seemed very confused by whatever UCF was showing him, and was having trouble working through his progressions.

Our offensive line once again could not dominate an undersized defensive front.

AJ Green couldn't get open on a route longer than 15 yards.

I thought Ealey ran very hard - and was HOSED on that call where they called him "down by stopping forward progress" even though he was still running, and picked up 9 more yards. Carlton Thomas looked good - but it's obvious we aren't utilizing him like we should be.

The defense, by and large, looked very good. There was the minor issue of their big tailback Murray hitting big holes for decent gains...but there were also a number of plays when our DL penetrated and stopped him BTL. Their QB was slowed considerably after Cornelius Washington (NOT Abry Jones as mis-identified repeatedly by Bob Davie) put a big hit on him early in the game. Ogletree was making good reads, though he did get sucked in once on PlayAction but luckily the pass was overthrown. Rambo looked good, the linebackers looked pretty good...I mean hell, the Dawgs gave up 10 points. That's the kind of defense we want to see.

On offense, the production simply wasn't there. Murray's two interceptions killed first-half drives. He also took a huge sack on a Play-Action bootleg and Georgia couldn't recover on that drive. Now, I don't know what the blocking scheme is, but often on that kind of play (a Naked Bootleg), the QB is responsiblie for the last man on the line of scrimmage. If he comes, the QB has to make him miss. Murray didn't do that. As a result, we had 2nd and 23. I don't recall the playcalling on 2nd down - I do remember that it wasn't a medium-range pass to get us into a manageable third down. But, this isn't going to become a post about Bobo's playcalling. I've gone on record as saying I believe he's good at his job.

Then again, perhaps that's problem-at-large at UGA. It's completely possible to have people who are good at their jobs, and yet not be good ENOUGH. The level of competition in the SEC is the highest in college football. Coaches are CLAMORING to get into this conference. Charlie Weiss, a Superbowl Champion coach, is going to leave an NFL squad to be an OC at FL? That HAS to tell you something.

What it tells ME is that the level of coaching in the SEC in 2011 will be just as high if not higher than it was in 2010, and certainly higher than it was in 2002-2005 (the "glory days" of recent past for UGA). This is why I say THANK GOD we lost that game.

Without losing that game, our kids and our coaching staff might have gone into the offseason thinking they were on the right track again. They could have played the whole "we won 7 of our last 9 games" idea in the media and in the locker room. They would have clung to the whole "a play here or there and we're 10-3" nonsense. But, at 6-7, there's just no way to gild the lilly. In 2010, UGA just plain stunk. Richt made a move in Strength and Conditioning, and that's good...probably overdue. Apparently Thomas Brown will join the staff today. That's a good move - he definitely knows a thing or two about strength and about motivation.

Richt is now entering his "evaluation" time. This is where, as he's told us, he sits down and evaluates the team's performance, evaulates the coaches' performance, and decides what changes need to be made in the direction of the program. This is a very important time. I don't know that UGA has seen a more important January in over a decade. In the next month, UGA has to lock down a strong recruiting class, figure out where its problems lie in the X's and O's arena, and develop a strategy to completely reverse whatever it was that we saw on the field in 2010.

That bowl game was the ultimate statement about this season. In 2010, our beloved Dawgs were Losers. We'll have to live with that. They'll have to live with that. Coach Richt will have to live with that - and he'll have to find a way to change it. That bowl game left about as sour a taste in the mouths of those players and that coaching staff as it possibly could have. There is only one cure for that kind of sour taste - absolute obliteration of everyone on the schedule next fall. What comes between is the hard part. What comes between is the coaches and players taking hard looks at themselves and admitting that they weren't good enough - that they didn't work hard enough - that they didn't do the things they had to do....and that they WILL change that in 2011.

We lost the Liberty Bowl in 2010. We're undefeated in 2011.

GO DAWGS!