TRANSCRIPT | Georgia Head Coach Kirby Smart Praises Lane Kiffin, Ole Miss team, and Fans after Loss: ‘That’s a great atmosphere to play a game in, and our kids will remember it forever’

OXFORD, Miss. — What a day it was in Vaught-Hemingway Saturday, as Ole Miss defeated No. 2 Georgia, 28-10, and vaulted back in the race for the 12-team College Football Playoffs.

After his team’s loss to the Rebels, head coach Kirby Smart discussed the game, the Ole Miss team’s performance, Lane Kiffin’s coaching, and the incredible atmosphere in the Vaught.

Here’s everything Coach Smart had to say. (Click HERE for everything Lane Kiffin said after the Rebels’ win.)

Kirby Smart’s Opening Statement

First off, a lot of credit to Ole Miss. Great atmosphere. They played a really good game. I thought Lane had his team ready to play. We obviously struggled in a lot of areas. We had miscues, mistakes, penalties, things that are really hard to overcome, especially when you play a really good football team. And they are. I told our team coming into this week, I felt like they were probably the most talented team that we had played, counting both sides of the ball and special teams. They have elite specialists and they have really good players on defense and the skill positions on offense. So give their quarterback credit. He made a lot of really good throws and their defense affected us with the pass rush. So a lot of credit goes to Lane and his staff. Look, they really should be undefeated. I know people think that’s not true, but they really controlled the game against LSU the whole game and and lost it. And they’re playing good football and they outplayed us tonight, outcoached us, and did a great job.

Media: Kirby, other than that first drive, what was the struggle as an offense to find a rhythm tonight?

Kirby Smart: Well, we didn’t have a great run game going, you know, and sometimes we ran the ball well. I thought that their front defensively stunts and moves a lot. So they’re very disruptive. So you have to be willing to go outside. We had some outside run game. I thought Nate (Frazier) did a really good job. Unfortunately he had the turnover. But he ran the ball really hard. And we talked all week about how they go after the ball. So give them credit. But when you have the penalties we have and you have the sacks, you’re not going to be very successful right? Penalties stop drives and sacks stopped drives. And we had both those.

Media: You talked about the offensive line. You’re dealing with injuries because a lot of shuffling happened there.

Kirby Smart: Yeah it’s tough right now because Tate (Ratledge) didn’t practice all week. We thought he’d be able to go like he did against Florida. He was not able to take much reps, but we thought he’d be able to go in the game just off experience. He struggled. That foot is still not completely healed and he’s out there giving us all he can and so that made it a little harder. Mike was still dealing with injury too, from the Florida game. So those two guys struggled. We tried to play a combination of (Xavier) Truss and Drew (Bobo), rotating in at guard and still playing our three tackles. They did a good job. Princely did a great job with get off. And when you get in a mode of ‘I have to throw the ball,’ you can get in trouble in this league, especially on the road. And we had some some drives there where we had to throw the ball. And we struggled to block Princely in obvious passing situations.

Media: What problems did you feel like Jaxson Dart presented tonight?

Kirby Smart: Well he’s talented. We knew that coming in, right? Like so there’s not a problem that he created tonight that we didn’t know about. He’s a really good athlete. We wanted to control the run game and force him into throwing it. And I thought we did that. You know, early in the game, we didn’t stop the run this late in the second half when we had to, but we stopped the run early and we forced him to be uncomfortable. But they did some good things down the field. Vertical passing game. I mean, they do a really good job with their vertical passing game and getting matchups. They switch routes. And (defensive coordinator Glenn) Schumann try to change it up between man match zone. I think we played decent on defense when we held them to field goals, but we couldn’t get a turnover. We couldn’t get a sack, we couldn’t get a momentum play and we kept just staying in the game until there late.

Media: Kirby, you mentioned what you told the team before the game about Ole Miss’ talent. What do you tell them after a loss like this?

Kirby Smart: It’s on to the next. I mean, welcome to the SEC, baby. I said when the season started that it was going to be the toughest schedule we’ve ever had in the SEC with the addition of, you know, the Texas game on top of all the others we had to play. And, it’s extremely tough. It’s difficult. I mean, the outlook of going to those four road games– the Kentucky, the Texas, the Alabama and this one — we knew it was going to be really tough. And as you go through the season, you get injuries. I mean, they got injuries too. Everybody’s got injuries. It just makes it tough. And, um, it’s tough. But you know what? Our future is in front of us. We got a big game next week. We got to go out and we got to find a way to execute at a higher level.

Media: Nobody on this squad has suffered two losses in a single season. How do you think they will respond after tonight?

Kirby Smart: Yeah. Those kids weren’t here. So just I think they’ll respond like they do everything. They’ll come out and compete, practice hard. I think you guys get caught up in all those numbers and records and all that. I don’t even care about that. Like, the only thing I’m worried about is how we get better tomorrow. Like, what can we do with our players tomorrow to get better? And our players will be fine. It’s a different world. Like, we’re not riding this roller coaster wave of emotion. We’re on a long journey. It’s a long journey. And you got to play the next play. You got to play the next game. And that’s the goal for this group. That’s what I told them in there. It’s like, ‘guys, our future is in front of us.’ We got to figure out how to get better.

Media: For you guys, Carson has had some turnover issues in the recent games.

Kirby Smart:….I thought he came out gunning and throwing. Carson had his best week of practice. I thought Carson did some good things. He threw some play action strikes. He stepped up and made some great third down plays. There was no, I don’t really know what you’re referencing. I guess you’re saying that we didn’t come out throwing the ball or. What are you saying? I thought Carson played good guys. I thought he played good. I mean, some of those penalties aren’t on him, you know, and some are. He had a couple snafus, too, where he maybe didn’t motion a guy or didn’t shift somebody in this part of the adjustment. And he knows that. But we put a lot on him and he’s playing on the road with crowd noise. But man, he stands in that pocket and converted some third downs and made some really nice plays. And I thought he threw the ball away a couple of times tonight. It was really good. So I’m not here to be critical of him.

Media: 70 yards of offense in the first half tonight. What was it that Ole Miss was able to do to sort of make life difficult for you guys?

Kirby Smart: What I talked about, getting lost yardage plays, when you talk about 70 yards, you’re talking about with the sacks. And we had some good plays in there that negated yards when you go backwards. So we ran the ball decent. They stunted and moved up front which makes it hard to run the ball interior, which I mentioned. You have to get on the perimeter on them. And we had some perimeter run game that helped us. We threw some now passes, did some stuff out of there but didn’t do enough to sustain and get things going.

Media: What was the impact of the drops do you feel in the passing game?

Kirby Smart: I don’t really know. I don’t know how many we had tonight, I didn’t. I know we had 1 or 2 there to late to Dylan and Arian, but you know, it’s a missed opportunity. That’s the toughest thing and we’ve dealt with that before. We got to overcome it.

Media: Speaking of the first half, I think it was Alabama where you said they on offense did some things that maybe you weren’t expecting coming into the game. Do you feel like Ole Miss also delivered some things you weren’t expecting in the passing game in the first half?

Kirby Smart: No, they did what they do. They did what they do and they did it well. They were short backs, so they went no back some. But we actually practiced and repped that some. We thought they would go no back because of their injuries. And they used 11. And some of the wide receivers in the backfield converted a really critical fourth down early in the game with a wide receiver in the backfield. But that’s something they always do. It’s not like new or different or anything. They’re just they’re good. I mean they’re good.

Media: After the Alabama loss you said that you learned about your team’s resilience. What did you learn about your team today?

Kirby Smart: That we need to get better, that we, we’ve got hard work in front of us, that we got a great group of men that I respect and I look forward to getting back to work. I mean, that’s, the biggest thing. There’s nothing I’m gonna learn about this team from that game, but how you respond to it and that’s life, right? Like how you respond to tough times defines who you are.

Media: How much is Trevor Etienne hurt, his ribs?

Kirby Smart: It’s hurting him some. You know, he was not able to do a lot during the week. He got to run a lot, but he didn’t get to to rep, take shots and take the physical contact that you probably need on Tuesday and Wednesday. Um, a lot of people don’t realize it, but you need to practice to be able to play good, and people think you can just not practice and go out there and play good. And that’s hard on him. But I thought he was really tough tonight and tried to go out there and tough it out and made some some good runs for us. But he didn’t. He didn’t feel like he had the same juice. He said he felt like he was a step slow.

Media: Kirby, when you say it’s a different world, not riding the emotions, is that specific to the 12 team playoff or are there other factors in that as well?

Kirby Smart: No, it’s specific to our league. I don’t think it has anything to do with the 12 team playoff. I think it has to do with the fact that our league is extremely tough. A lot of parity, anybody can beat anybody. I honestly believe that. And how you prepare each week defines your team. I mean, we could be looking at, I don’t know. It’s going to be interesting the way this thing plays out. I told people it’s not going to surprise me if every team in the league ends up with two losses, just because it’s that way. It’s tough.

Media: Kirby, you knew you had this kind of road gauntlet before three home games to end the season. What’s it been like to to live through that with your team?

Kirby Smart: It’s SEC life. Like it’s what you signed up for. It’s what kids want to come play in this league all the time. That atmosphere. People want to play in that. That’s awesome. That’s a great atmosphere to play a game in, and our kids will remember it forever. They’ll remember they lost. But that, look guys, they (Ole Miss) create a tough environment to snap and run plays. You will never understand what it’s like to go out there and play tackle when you can’t hear anything, and there’s a guy screaming off that edge, it is tough. I’ve been on the other side of that for a lot of years where you’re playing at home and you got pass rushers and it doesn’t matter what you do, you better be able to run the ball. You better be able to run the ball, and you better be able to control the game and the score where you’re not in obvious passing situations.

Media: With the field storming there at the end, were you able to get your team off and have everyone safe and accounted for?

Kirby Smart: I don’t know. I hope so. I mean, I felt like our team was, we got everybody off but the defensive guys. But it’s not something you can really control, right?

Media: With them (Ole Miss) is the the risk of blitzing maybe a little higher because of what they can do, throwing the ball downfield? When you blitz, are you running a higher risk than maybe you would against another opponent because of just how effective their offense is that they they’re able to pick it up.

Kirby Smart: We could talk a really long time about that. And that’s philosophical, because some people would tell you blitz when you can’t cover them, right. Because you give them less time. So it’s not that easy. You know, we rush three, we rush four, we rush five, we change things up. So it’s not I mean, it’s not worth having the debate about right now. It’s hard question to answer.