"We don’t want to be a one-hit wonder": Georgia HC Kirby Smart gets real on Bulldogs' mindset ahead of 2024 college football season

Georgia's head coach, Kirby Smart, shared his insights into the Bulldogs' upcoming 2024 football season during an appearance on The Paul Finebaum Show.

After narrowly missing the playoffs in 2023 following back-to-back national titles, Smart says the team doesn't want its time on top to be over so quickly. Instead, the Bulldogs' goal is to achieve sustained success and dominance despite a tough schedule (Starts at 4:06).

"We’ll be the favorite in some people’s eyes,” Smart remarked. “Some people will find things wrong with us. We’ve got a really hard schedule. We play three top-15 teams on the road in our conference, that’s tough.”

“We’ve got a good football team. We’ve got a very consistent football team,” he said. “We say it all the time, ‘We’re built to sustain at Georgia. We don’t want to be a one-hit wonder," Kirby said.

Kirby Smart and the Bulldogs will have a huge clash with the Clemson Tigers as well as their historic matchup with rivals Georgia Tech on the non-conference schedule. Moreover, they have to deal with a difficult SEC schedule, which includes three road games against the top 15 teams.

Among these challenging road games, the Bulldogs will confront Alabama, Texas, and Ole Miss. Despite having a bye week preceding the Alabama matchup, it follows another demanding road trip to Kentucky.

Furthermore, there's no respite before the Texas and Ole Miss games, with the latter scheduled right after the intense Florida-Georgia clash in Jacksonville, Fla.

Kirby Smart remains confident amid Georgia's tough 2024 schedule

On paper, the Georgia Bulldogs look to have a tough football season in 2024. Their in-conference road games in particular have the potential to be quite tricky.

But with the starting quarterback Carson Beck back and the strategic transfers from the transfer portal adding to the team's depth, Kirby Smart expects a competitive season.

"I think we’re going to have a good football team next year," Smart said. "I don’t know how good, and I don’t know how we’ll play on some really tough road games, but we’ll see where it falls."

Georgia's 2024 schedule looks like this:

Aug. 31 - vs Clemson (Atlanta, Ga.)
Sept. 7 - vs Tennessee Tech
Sept. 14 - @ Kentucky
Sept. 21 - BYE
Sept. 28 @ Alabama
Oct. 5 - vs Auburn
Oct. 12 - vs Mississippi State
Oct. 19 - @ Texas
Oct. 26 - BYE
Nov. 2 - vs Florida (Jacksonville, Fl.)
Nov. 9 - @ Ole Miss
Nov. 16 - vs Tennessee
Nov. 23 vs UMass
Nov. 30 vs Georgia Tech

Under the head coach Kirby Smart, the 2023 Georgia Bulldogs football team chased a third consecutive national championship. Even with a 13-1 record and winning the SEC Eastern Division, they missed CFP because of their loss to Alabama in the SEC Championship.

Nonetheless, Georgia set a bowl game record with a resounding 60-point victory over Florida State in the Orange Bowl. The season saw their remarkable 29-game win streak halted by Alabama, marking the first occasion a top-ranked team missed the playoffs post-championship weekend.