ATLANTA — Forgive family, friends and neighbors for being less than enthused by your New Year’s festivities. Double that forgiveness for any odd barking you hear from company, young and old.
And finally, forgive the delirium throughout the evening by those with their attention elsewhere. It’s not the spiked eggnog. It’s college football. It’s Georgia trying to achieve something fans considered a fantasy for decades.
For those less versed with this sport that prompts such absurdity, the Georgia Bulldogs are playing at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in the College Football Playoff against the Ohio State Buckeyes on New Year’s Eve. The game kicks off at 8 p.m., aligning it to end just before the ball drops in Times Square (or Underground Atlanta) to ring in 2023.
In other words, the Bulldogs fans in your life won’t be inclined to turn their attention away from the game. Ryan Seacrest and company will have to wait (or at least settle for being an alternative to commercials).
This is the second consecutive year that Georgia is playing so late in the season with so much on the line. The Bulldogs destroyed Michigan on New Year’s Eve in 2021. Just over a week later, Georgia defeated Alabama for the national championship, their first title since 1980. Remember when Georgia won, how so many friends, family members and colleagues were overcome with joy and emotion as if they were responsible? As if they caught the winning touchdown or they intercepted the key pass? The Bulldogs are trying to provide their enthusiasts that post-New Year’s cheer again.
They’ll need two wins to do it. Here are the CliffsNotes for what’s unfolding: Georgia is one of four teams that qualified for the College Football Playoff. Georgia, being 13-0, earned the top seed, meaning 1) it’s the tournament favorite and 2) it gets geographic preference in the neutral-site semifinal game.
The sites hosting the semifinal games on New Year’s Eve are the Phoenix area and Atlanta. Arizona is lovely this time of year, but the Bulldogs are staying in state for their game. It’s nonetheless considered neutral, and while Buckeyes fans travel well, it would be foolish to suggest this isn’t an advantage for Georgia playing at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. That only furthers the hope the Bulldogs will advance, beyond them simply having the best team.
Michigan and TCU, the other playoff participants, will play earlier in the day in Arizona. If Georgia defeats Ohio State, it will face the winner of that game in the Los Angeles area Jan. 9 for the national championship. Georgia-Michigan would be a rematch of the semifinal game last year, which the Bulldogs won comfortably.
Georgia, which went over four decades without a title before January, can become the seventh program to win consecutive titles. That’s quite a way to reward the faithful for their patience.
Since 1936, when college football polls were introduced, the programs to win back-to-back national titles are Minnesota (1940-41), Army (1944-45), Notre Dame (1946-47), Oklahoma (1955-56), Nebraska (1994-95) and Alabama (2011-12). If you live in the South, even if football isn’t your thing, you’re probably aware of how exceptional Alabama has been at this sport. Georgia is on the verge of becoming the next version of that.
Just as the entertainment world always has a leading boyband – The Beatles, The Beach Boys, NSYNC, the Backstreet Boys, One Direction, BTS – college athletics always has a shining example at the forefront; the program that everybody idolizes.
Lately, that’s been Alabama. Now Georgia is trying to become that standard. Their fans, passionate even when outcomes were bleak, are responding accordingly.
Especially on New Year’s Eve.
