The Georgia Bulldogs are gearing up for a rematch against Pete Golding and the Ole Miss Rebels in the quarterfinals of the College Football Playoff. The two SEC teams will meet in the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 1 in New Orleans.
The last time they met was on Oct. 18 in Athens. Georgia was ranked No. 9, and Ole Miss was No. 5. UGA was behind by nine points in the fourth quarter and came back to win the game 43-35.
Lane Kiffin was the Rebels’ head coach at the time. He’s now at LSU and not coaching Ole Miss in the CFP. The program named Golding, the team’s former defensive coordinator, as Kiffin’s replacement. Golding, a fan favorite in Oxford, is 1-0 as head coach at Ole Miss, beating Tulane 41-10 in the first round of the CFP.
Georgia, the No. 3-seed in the CFP, enters the Sugar Bowl as a 6.5-point favorite over No. 6-seed Ole Miss. Golding knows he has his hands full with a UGA team that’s caught fire down the stretch.
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Pete Golding complimentary of Georgia
At a recent press conference, Golding had nothing but good things to say about UGA. It was a lot of good things, actually. Some even said too many good thing.
“Hopefully we can at least get them to punt one time this time,” Golding said.
That’s in reference to the October game, where Georgia had the ball nine times and scored on eight of them. The other one was Georgia letting time expire to close out the game.
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Golding’s certainly familiar with Georgia. He was DC at Alabama from 2018-22 and again at Ole Miss from 2023 until being named head coach on Nov. 30.
“Probably the premier college football team in my opinion and probably have been for awhile,” Golding added.
He went 3-1 against Georgia while under Nick Saban. He’s 2-1 against the Dawgs while at Ole Miss.
Both teams are 12-1 and are capable of winning a national championship. Practically everyone is going with the Dawgs, but don’t forget that the Rebels’ only loss this year came to Georgia. And that game was in Sanford Stadium. It’s also one that Ole Miss fans probably feel they should’ve won.
“They’ve been in a lot of big games and they don’t panic,” Golding added.
