The No. 2 Georgia Bulldogs host the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers for the second time in school history. Georgia won the first meeting 20 years ago in 2006. The Bulldogs will debut all-white uniforms against Western Kentucky. The Bulldogs are heavy favorites against Western Kentucky, who is a member of Conference USA.

In Week 1, Georgia beat the Tennessee State Tigers 63-3. Tennessee State is a member of the Football Championship Subdivision and received $600,000 to come to Sanford Stadium for one game.

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Georgia is paying Western Kentucky $1.9 million to play at Georgia. The Bulldogs and coach Kirby Smart are paying top dollar to host the Hilltoppers, who suffered a 49-14 blowout loss to the Nevada Wolfpack in Week 1.

Western Kentucky’s 35-point loss to Nevada comes as a bit of a surprise. The Hilltoppers have made seven straight bowl games and have won eight or more games in every season since COVID-19.

“It shows you that they have a tremendous evaluation process,” Georgia coach Kirby Smart said of Western Kentucky coach Tyson Helton. “They’ve done a great job of developing players. It’s changed, and he’s changed with it because they’ve had to dip into the portal and take more kids out of the portal because more of theirs have moved on through the portal.”

Georgia’s payment to Western Kentucky is not unprecedented. In Week 1, Michigan paid $1.5 million and nearly lost to Western Michigan. Two years ago, Georgia paid $1.9 million to play UMass.

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The Georgia-Western Kentucky game will kickoff on Saturday, Sept. 12 at 12:45 p.m. ET. We’ll see if the Bulldogs can their money’s worth against the Hilltoppers.

Follow UGA Wire on Instagram, Facebook, X (formerly Twitter) or Threads for more Georgia football coverage!

This article originally appeared on UGA Wire: How much is Georgia football paying Western Kentucky?

Josh Pate uses Colorado’s physical showing in Atlanta in Week 1 to frame Tennessee’s trip to Georgia Tech in Week 2 — noting the Volunteers’ edge on the line of scrimmage and at tailback and the wrinkle of true freshman Faizon Brandon making his first road start.

Subscribe to “Josh Pate’s College Football Show” on YouTube.

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Video Transcript

Tennessee is a 13 and a half point favorite at Georgia Tech.

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Now, this goes back to what I said at the intro of the show.

How much of week one in college football translates to week two?

And once you answer that for yourself, you will answer what the upset alert concern meter is here.

‘Cause in week one, what did we see?

We saw Deion Sanders and Colorado come into Georgia Tech and sorta, kinda own the line of scrimmage a little bit, at way more than we thought they would.

We saw them not take a back seat physically to Georgia Tech in any shape, form, or fashion, and we saw them able to run the ball.

Colorado badly, badly out-rushed Georgia Tech, so if all that happened in week one, Tennessee’s better on the line of scrimmage than Colorado.

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I’ll guarantee you that.

Tennessee’s better at tailback than Colorado.

I’ll guarantee you that.

So this is where pride and performance comes in.

This is where the controllables for Georgia Tech come in.

Two of three in the red zone for six points, two missed field goals, nine penalties.

Some of these things are correctable.

We do have Faizon Brandon, true freshman quarterback, making his first start on the road here.

I’m gonna put a six on the upset alert concern meter.

The model for some unknown reason loves Georgia Tech this week.

More on the model later.

A lot more on the model later.

This bears watching.

We’ll talk about it in the viewer guide later.

This bears watching.

I’m gonna put a six on it.

Anything can happen

Close

ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) — Georgia is set to carry out its first execution of the year next Wednesday night.

Stacey Humphreys, 53, was convicted of malice murder in the 2003 killings of Cyndi Williams, 33, and Lori Brown, 21. He is set to receive a lethal injection at 7 p.m. Sept. 16 at the state prison near Jackson, according to the Georgia Department of Corrections.

For his last meal, prison officials said Humphreys requested barbecue beef brisket, pork ribs, a bacon double cheeseburger with fries, buffalo wings, a meat lovers pan pizza and two caffeine-free sodas. For dessert, he chose butter pecan ice cream and peach ice cream.

Humphreys seeks new sentencing trial

Humphrey’s attorney has filed a motion seeking a new sentencing trial, claiming juror misconduct.

In a motion filed Aug. 28, Humphreys’ lawyer claims one of the jurors lied during jury selection by concealing “the truth about her own prior experience as a sexual assault victim at the hands of an escaped murderer in order to obtain a seat on the jury.”

Once on the jury, “and long before the evidence had closed, she made clear that she would consider no option other than a death sentence,” Humphreys’ attorney claims.

During sentencing deliberations, the jury remained deadlocked. At one point, the 11 other jurors voted against execution, the lawyer claims.

During those deliberations, the juror “invoked her prior victim experience” that she allegedly hid during jury selection “to implore her fellow jurors to change their life votes to death.”

The juror “deliberately misled the other jurors about the consequences of their deadlock—suggesting that unless they could be unanimous, Mr. Humphreys would walk free,” Humphreys’ lawyer claims.

Instead, Georgia law required the judge to dismiss the jury and impose a sentence of life imprisonment if jurors could not reach a unanimous verdict on the sentence, the motion says.

“Crucially, she lied to this Court a second time: she concealed the intractable nature of the jury’s deadlock as to sentence,” Humphreys’ lawyer wrote. “Had this Court been told the truth—that the jurors always were and always would be irreconcilably deadlocked as to the correct sentence, rather than merely ‘currently unable to agree’ as the juror led this Court to believe—then Georgia law required this Court to impose a life sentence.”

Over the course of three days, the juror allegedly “bullied and insulted the other jurors and eventually refused to deliberate altogether, retreating to the corner to do yoga,” the motion says.

The other jurors eventually “surrendered their conscientious votes only after being told, falsely, that there was no other option,” and opted for the death penalty, according to the motion.

The lawyer claims that if not for the juror’s “deliberate deceit,” Humphreys would be serving a sentence of life without parole “consistent with the votes of the other eleven jurors” but instead, “he stands perilously close to the death chamber.”

The motion asks for a new sentencing trial “consistent with the principles of justice and equity” and “all other equitable relief necessary and appropriate consistent with the principles of justice and equity.”

Humphreys would be the first person executed in Georgia this year. The death penalty in the state has largely been tied up in litigation over an agreement related to the coronavirus pandemic that defense lawyers contend temporarily shields many death row residents from execution. The last execution in the state was in March 2024.

Humphreys was previously scheduled to die last December, but the execution was halted after his lawyers filed a petition asking a judge to order two members of the State Board of Pardons and Paroles to recuse themselves from hearing his clemency petition. Humphreys’ lawyers argued that the two parole board members had conflicts of interest because they had played roles during his trial.

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