OXFORD, Miss. — A phrase stood out as Georgia players spoke Saturday night after a resounding 28-10 loss at Ole Miss. There was safety Malaki Starks, relaying what Kirby Smart had told the team:

“Don’t come out and point fingers, we don’t need to point fingers, just look yourself in the mirror and realize what you’ve got to do better.”

Next up was nose tackle Nazir Stackhouse.

“We’re not a pointing fingers-type team,” Stackhouse said. “We know some guys have struggled, but that’s why we’re a team. We keep each other up, and we’ve got each’s other back.”

Well, good news: Nobody on this Georgia team is playing well enough to deserve to point fingers at anyone else.

What is the one thing that this team is very good at? What is the thing that you can count on it being good at in any game, no matter what? Well, other than the punter and the place kicker, who are both booting it very well. The fact they are inarguably the best things about this team right now says enough.

Blame the offense, as many Georgia fans do, and for ample reasons: the lack of a run game, the absence of explosive plays, the offensive line that isn’t getting any better, the quarterback who appears to have regressed.

Blame the defense, which had Ole Miss pinned against its goal line — thanks to a punt from team MVP Brett Thorson — and then proceeded to let the Rebels complete a 16-yard slant pass that the whole building knew was coming. Or the defense that, after the offense showed some life early in the second half, allowed Ole Miss to drive back down the field to make it a two-possession game again.

There’s complementary football. This was compliment-less football.

That’s been Georgia almost all season. The closest it has come to a complete game on both sides of the ball was the Oct. 19 win at Texas, with the season-opening win against Clemson a close second, though the latter did include a slow start by the offense. Otherwise, the season has been a mish-mash of consistency, with sparks of greatness on both sides and frustrating stretches on both sides. Entering this weekend, Georgia ranked seventh in the SEC in offensive yards per play, and sixth in defensive yards per play. Not great in either.

Some of that can be attributed the schedule. Georgia has now played four teams ranked in the College Football Playoff selection committee’s first Top 25, and all of them won on Saturday. It has played four road games, three starting at night and the fourth (Ole Miss) under the lights for most of the second half. That’s the kind of schedule that magnifies flaws.

But the flaws are being quite magnified.

The offensive line, an expected strength, has been a liability. The unit is banged up, especially at guard, but the tackles have not been good.

The wide receivers and tight ends are what they’ve always been: no game changers but no bums either, good enough as a group to win with but lately prone to ill-timed drops.

Quarterback Carson Beck hasn’t been consistent, but he also hasn’t had much of a run game to lean on. And yes, offensive coordinator Mike Bobo can call plays better.

An observation: Georgia’s offense feature a lot of pre-snap movement on Saturday, a lot of moments where guys were pointing at each other to the right place. Consider the sequence near the end of the first half, when the offense should have been running quicker plays to try to get points but ended up taking way too much time between plays, then punting anyway.

It may be time to simplify things. Smart talks all the time about how much the staff puts on Beck as far as checking in and out of plays at the line, protections, motions, etc. Maybe it’s time to play free and easy. Quit trying to outwit the defense and just outplay them. You’re Georgia, you should still have the talent to do that.

The defense needs to take that approach, too. There’s way too much talent on this unit to look as helpless as it has at times, especially Saturday. Find a way to play with more swagger.

Here’s the thing: This season isn’t as dire as it may seem. It just doesn’t measure up to past years. So it’s understandable that fans and outsiders would wonder if this just isn’t a good Georgia team. But recent years’ teams didn’t have two things:

1. This hard a schedule.
2. This much margin for error.

Smart is in his ninth year as Georgia’s coach, and this is only the third time in that span that the Bulldogs have lost two games in the regular season. The first two times (2016, 2020), the second loss meant the Playoff hopes were over. This time Georgia is still Playoff-viable and still has a chance at an SEC championship, down but very far from out.

“It’s a different world,” Smart said. “We’re not riding this roller coaster wave of emotion. We’re on a long journey. It’s a long journey, and you got to play the next play, you got to play the next game, because that’s the goal. That’s why I told the players: Guys, our future’s in front of us. We’ve got to figure out how to get better.”

Figuring that out this late into the season is the issue. It may be that this just isn’t a good enough team, with too many flaws on both sides of the ball.

It could also mean there’s still upside for this team. Georgia has recruited top-three recruiting classes and supplemented them in the portal, and the head coach has two rings. If this team gets in the Playoff, and the chances of that are still good (69 percent, per Austin Mock’s projections), it will be the team nobody wants to face.

But this team is also nine games in, and at this point it’s fair to wonder whether we should just believe what we’ve seen it to be so far: flawed on offense, inconsistent on defense, just not very good overall.

Maybe it’s time to lower expectations. Then be ready to be surprised.

“Man, I don’t even know how to explain it,” Starks said. “I guess it is a different world, college football the way it’s set up. The teams that handle that the best will move on, and at the end of the day we’re just trying to be one of those.”

(Photo: Justin Ford / Getty Images)

There important results in Week 11 of the college football season that will shake conference and playoff races. Matt Hayes analyzes four hot topics from Saturday’s games.

1. First Down: Lane Kiffin, the ball coach

Don’t take the bait. Don’t focus on the fall of Georgia and the undoing of the best program in college football ― and ignore the rise of Lane Kiffin.

Because there’s no denying it now: Kiffin is a legit ball coach.

“We planned for this game all year,” Kiffin said while Ole Miss fans stormed the field moments after a stunning 28-10 whipping of Georgia.

It’s not that Ole Miss became the first team in 53 games not named Alabama to beat Georgia. It’s not that the win left the Rebels with a clear road to the College Football Playoff.

It’s that Kiffin, long the college football coaching outcast because of how his career began – not how it has developed – got his first mega win in the big, bad SEC. Forget about the top-five win against Oregon in 2011 as the USC coach, this is different.

This is a victory that underscores the five-year buildout that until Saturday had been equal parts the school record for single season wins (11 in 2023), and a handful of ugly losses to SEC heavyweights Alabama, LSU and Georgia. In fact, it was the loss to Georgia last season – a humiliating 35-point defeat – that paved the way for this season of change.

That 52-17 loss to the Dawgs was the worst of Kiffin’s career, and – fair or not –further solidified him as the coach who couldn’t win big games. Never mind that he was building at Ole Miss, a perennial underachiever in the meatgrinder conference.

You’re judged on what you do in the SEC, not what you say or post on X. And Kiffin wasn’t earning it.

So he pushed all-in this offseason, and the Georgia game was his now or never. He told the Ole Miss NIL collectives he needed cash to compete, and he got it.

He built the roster from the inside out through, focusing on the lines of scrimmage on both sides of the ball and adding key pieces through the transfer portal. The plan was simple: run the ball on offense, affect the quarterback on defense.

He convinced offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach and play caller Charlie Weis Jr., to stay in Oxford, instead of taking more money from Florida coach Billy Napier to run the Gators’ offense.

And here we are: the Rebels lead the nation in sacks (46), and are No. 2 in the nation in total offense. Ole Miss is two improbable fourth-down completions in late losses to Kentucky and LSU from an unbeaten season.

Ole Miss gave up 611 yards in last year’s 52-17 loss to Georgia, and gave up 245 Saturday. The Rebels didn’t get a sack in last year’s game, and got five this time around – and forced three turnovers.   

Now Ole Miss is two wins – at Florida and home against rival Mississippi State – from reaching the CFP as an at-large selection (watch how high the Rebels jump in this week’s CFP poll), and could play in the SEC championship game with a little help.

There’s no denying it now: Kiffin is a legit ball coach.

UP AND DOWN: Georgia’s loss leads Week 11 winners and losers

2. Second Down: Deion and the CFP

You know it, I know it. This thing is destined for Deion Sanders and the CFP: the biggest personality in the sport, and the new 12-team playoff.

A match made in television heaven.

We’ve seen everything in a wild Big 12 race, and now we’re primed (pun intended) for a remarkable one-season turnaround. It’s all setting up for Colorado coach Deion Sanders to lead the Buffs to the Big 12 championship game – and one game away from the playoff

Not just any spot – an automatic qualifier spot, which comes with a coveted first-round bye. That means more Prime, all the time.  

From losing eight of nine games to finish the 2023 season, to controlling its destiny in the Big 12 race, Colorado needs wins against Utah, at Kansas and against Oklahoma State – the Buffs will be favored in all three games — to complete a remarkable turnaround.

BUFFS CHARGE: Colorado starts slow before rolling past Texas Tech

An improbable run from a team that couldn’t protect star quarterback Shedeur Sanders in September, and couldn’t get off the field defensively for the first six weeks of the season.

But after Saturday’s 41-27 win at Texas Tech, it’s clear the Buffs have figured it out. CU went into the toughest place to play in the Big 12, and forced three turnovers (and didn’t give up a turnover), and had six sacks.

The Buffs won despite rushing for only 60 yards, and committing 14 penalties for 106 yards. They won because they consistently made plays on offense when they needed it, and got stops (and got off the field) against a Texas Tech offense that last week rolled the best defense in the conference (Iowa State).

That can only mean one thing: more Prime, all the time.

3. Third Down: Kurtis Rourke, Heisman candidate

He doesn’t have the numbers of Cam Ward or Ashton Jeanty, or the efficiency of Dillon Gabriel, or the big-play game of Travis Hunter.

But if you’re looking for an impactful player in the thick of the CFP race, a player who has elevated a program from the depths of the Bowl Subdivision cellar to an unbeaten season, it’s time to take a long look at Indiana quarterback Kurtis Rourke.

A sixth-year senior transfer from Ohio, Rourke made big throws again Saturday, this time in a 20-15 win over Michigan to give the Hoosiers their first 10-win season in program history. History.

Rourke threw for 206 yards and two touchdowns, and now has a TD/INT ratio of 21/4 in nine games. But strong performances against Michigan, Michigan State and UCLA are one thing. Playing big at Ohio State in two weeks is the bar.

If Rourke has a big game and leads Indiana to an upset of the Buckeyes, watch how quickly momentum turns in his favor in the Heisman race. He’ll go from a fun novelty leading a team that really doesn’t have a signature win, to a Heisman front-runner with arguably the best win of any team in the CFP race.      

4. Fourth Down: Miami meltdown burns ACC

Look beyond another Miami loss to double-digit underdog Georgia Tech, and look directly at the ACC race to the CFP.

And how Miami’s 28-23 defeat Saturday all but ends the ACC’s chances of getting a second team in the 12-team playoff. Unless the remainder of November is full of upsets, it’s likely only one ACC team is part of the field.

The conference is watered-down, the star power outside of the Hurricanes is limited and the resume for any potential playoff contender consists of wins against the worst Power Four conference in the game. The ACC’s best chance at getting more than its champion in the CFP was SMU winning out and beating undefeated Miami in the ACC championship game.

The easiest way to explain it: Miami’s best resume win will be the ACC championship game. So will SMU’s. So will Pitt’s, and Clemson’s.

See the trend?

“You can’t sugarcoat it,” Miami coach Mario Cristobal said in his postgame press conference. “We didn’t do a good enough job.”

And that has left the Canes (9-1 overall, 5-1 ACC) with no more CFP wiggle room. They’ll go from the projected ACC champion in last week’s CFP poll, to potentially falling behind two-loss SEC teams and outside the top 10 in this week’s poll.

Miami’s schedule is among the easiest in the Power Four, and SMU isn’t far behind – though the Mustangs’ schedule is slightly better with a three-point home loss to Big 12 leader Brigham Young. This is how quickly it can turn in the CFP race.

Miami has gone from the thrill-a-minute team with the Heisman Trophy favorite (Ward) leading second half comebacks, to the team giving up an average of 31.6 points in six ACC games — with no room for error the rest of the season.

Matt Hayes is the senior national college football writer for USA TODAY Sports Network. Follow him on X at @MattHayesCFB.

The final injury report ahead of the Georgia vs Ole Miss game has been released.

The Georgia Bulldogs are set for their final road game of the 2024 season as they gear up for their matchup with the Ole Miss Rebels. This will be the 45th meeting between these two teams in a series that Georgia controls 33-10-1.

The Bulldogs won the last meeting between these two teams in 2023 when the Dawgs dismantled Ole Miss in Athens to a 52-17 beating. This year provides a different opportunity as both teams remain in the inaugural 12-team playoff hunt.

Ahead of the game, the SEC has released the final injury report for both teams and here is where it currently sits:

Georgia vs Ole Miss Final Injury Report:

Georgia:
– Roderick Robinson, RB: Out
– Anthony Evans, WR: Out
– Branson Robinson, RB: Out
– Joseph Jonah-Ajonye, DL: Out
– Micah Morris, OL: Game Time Decision
– Smael Mondon, LB: Game Time Decision

Ole Miss:
– Izaiah Hartrup, TE: Out
– Henry Parrish Jr., RB: Out
– Logan Diggs, RB: Out
– Jayden Williams, OL: Game Time Decision
– Matt Jones, RB: Game Time Decision
– Tre Harris, WR: Game Time Decision

ESPN insider Pete Thamel said on College Gameday that Harris will play but will likely be limited and is not expected to be a major contributor against the Dawgs.

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