On a defense with three projected NFL first-round draft picks in 2025, the guy who made the biggest plays in Georgia football’s instant classic, eight overtime win over Georgia Tech Friday night was hardly a blip on the Bulldogs’ recruiting radar.

Safety Dan Jackson’s punishing hit on Georgia Tech quarterback Haynes King — “one for the ages” in the words of coach Kirby Smart — forced a fumble that set the Bulldogs up to score and force overtime.

Georgia Tech and some outside observers thought Jackson should have been called for targeting on the game-changing hit on King in regulation.

He wasn’t done. Jackson shot up the middle on a safety blitz and brought down King in the sixth overtime.

Pretty heady stuff for a guy that came to Georgia as a walk-on, right?

Jackson had offers out of North Hall High in Gainesville from Air Force and Division II Shorter.

He got accepted to Georgia and walked on with the team after reaching out to the staff. He’s now thriving in his sixth season with the Bulldogs.

“I was just excited for the opportunity ’cause I’ve always wanted to come here,” Jackson said Monday.

“We’re lucky to have Dan Jackson because we fell into him,” Smart said earlier this season. “We didn’t do one thing to earn Dan being here. He came to us, and he has made himself into a really good football player, but he did that through hard work. He’s proof that if you stick around and you have toughness and you’re smart, you’re going to play.”

Those same qualities can be found in running back Cash Jones, who also came to Georgia as a walk-on and also came up huge in big moments in the 44-42 win Friday.

Jones led Georgia in receiving yards with 53 on four catches, none bigger than a 25-yard touchdown on a wheel route on Georgia’s first play of the second overtime after Georgia Tech had gone ahead.

Jackson and Jones are two unlikely cogs for No. 5 Georgia, which plays No. 2 Texas on Saturday in Atlanta for the SEC championship.

On a team loaded with talent from elite recruiting classes stacked one on top another, they are the latest walk-on success stories for a program that had the ultimate in two-time winning national championship quarterback Stetson Bennett.

With the SEC planning to stay at 85 scholarships for football in 2025, walk-on spots could be trimmed to just 20 due to the start of revenue sharing and stories like Jackson and Jones could become rarer.

Jones was a New Mexico State commitment at one time, but the Brock, Texas, native didn’t get a sniff from Texas or Texas A&M. He’s admitted he’s shorter than his listed 6-foot, 182 pounds, but has thrived in a third-down role for Georgia.

He has more touchdown catches in a single season— three —than any Georgia running back since James Cook’s four in 2021. That was Jones’ first season with the Bulldogs.

“I think he’s a really smart football player and I think you never put that past someone,” quarterback Carson Beck said. “The intelligence in the game of football, it goes a long way. His understanding of defense and coverage, ‘Is a linebacker on me, is a safety on me? It it zone, is it man? How do I need to run this route?’ It helps a lot and it truly gives you an advantage when you can think that way.”

Beck says a running back like Jones against a linebacker or safety is a mismatch.

“He spent a year on the scout team as a receiver, guys,” Smart said. “There are clips of him running around out there against Kamari (Lassiter) and Kelee Ringo, like going one-on-one at receiver, and he’s catching deep balls. So, he’s like a jack of all trades.”

Jones’ role has expanded even more with Trevor Etienne battling injured ribs since the Florida game.

His profile rose early last season with the running backs shorthanded, but played sparingly in the back end of the regular season and didn’t play in the SEC championship game a year ago.

The 6-foot-1, 200-pound Jackson, on the other hand, has logged the third-most snaps — 581 — of any Georgia defensive player this season, according to Pro Football Focus. That’s with having to sit out the first half of the Florida game due to a targeting call at Texas.

Malaki Starks, who like defensive end Mykel Williams and linebacker Jalen Wilson are viewed as first-round talents, said he and Jackson “kind of feed off each other.”

“When I’m down, he picks me up and when he’s down, I pick him up,” Starks said.

Jackson had a significant role in 2021 including four starts but was a backup the last two seasons while battling a foot injury.

This year, he leads the team with two interceptions and is third in tackles with 56.

“I really believe the guy’s got a chance to play in the National Football League because he’s fast, he’s tough, and he’s smart,” Smart said after the win over Auburn in early October.

Jim Nagy, the Senior Bowl director, posted on X late in the game Friday that if Jackson wasn’t “a former walk-on the narrative around him as an NFL prospect would be way different.”

Jackson plans to pursue landing a spot in the NFL after this season.

“That was one of the goals I had for myself,” he said.

It may not be as much of a longshot as it once would have seemed.