DANIA BEACH, Fla. — Georgia's hopes for a third straight national championship ended with a loss to Alabama in the SEC championship game, but coach Kirby Smart said his players refused to let that moment be their final memories of the 2023 season.
The Bulldogs enter Saturday's Capital One Orange Bowl against Florida State with no players who have publicly opted out of the game, and Smart said that's a credit to the team's leadership. «The leaders of the team spearheaded that,» Smart said Friday. «I stayed out of it.
I met with each player who was draft-eligible and the seniors, and I was very honest. Then they had to make a decision with their family.
But they want to go out on top. They don't want their last Georgia outing to be the SEC championship.» Smart said the decisions to play in the bowl game were «kind of contagious,» where after one or two players announced their intention, everyone else got on board.