After a few years of uncertainty, the SEC schedule for Georgia’s football team is on much more solid ground through 2025. When the SEC held its schedule at eight games last month, the only question left was the identity of the one annual rotating opponent. The SEC has released those rotating opponents today.

Georgia’s SEC Rotating Opponent:

2014: at Arkansas
2015: vs. Alabama
2016: at Ole Miss
2017: vs. Mississippi State
2018: at LSU
2019: vs. Texas A&M
2020: at Alabama
2021: vs. Arkansas
2022: at Mississippi State
2023: vs. Ole Miss
2024: at Texas A&M
2025: vs. LSU

The addition of Alabama does breathe some life into a lackluster 2015 home schedule. The biggest disappointment about the rotation plan? Georgia won’t make its first trip to Texas A&M until 2024. They won’t even play the Aggies (SEC Championship games notwithstanding) until 2019 – seven years after A&M joined the conference.

The rest of Georgia’s SEC schedule (East plus Auburn) will continue to rotate home-and-home as usual. Knowing that, we can piece together the SEC part of the schedule for the next 12 seasons.

Of course all of this assumes that 1) the SEC schedule stays at eight games and 2) the rotation plan isn’t scrapped at some point over the next ten years. Anyone want to place bets on that?

Georgia softball has been as high as #1 in the RPI this season, but they ended up ranked in the mid-teens after losing nine games in the brutal SEC. The team got hot at the right time though and made program history over the weekend: they ripped off three straight wins at the SEC Tournament in Columbia, SC, to capture the program’s first SEC Tournament championship. Georgia took care of perennial powers Florida and Alabama in the first two games and held off underdog Kentucky in the title game.

The Dawgs have another solid lineup this year, but it might be pitching that carries them back to Oklahoma City. Sophomore Chelsea Wilkinson was brilliant in Georgia’s SEC run, and she was deservedly named the tournament’s MVP.

Another high water mark for the program was set Sunday night when they received one of the top 4 national seeds in the upcoming NCAA Tournament (the equivalent of a #1 seed in the basketball tournament.) Georgia’s #4 overall seed means that they’ll get to host both the regional and (should they advance) super regional rounds in Athens. Regional action starts this Friday against Chattanooga, and UAB and NC State will round out the regional field. Regionals are double-elimination with games taking place from Friday-Sunday.

2014 NCAA ATHENS REGIONAL SCHEDULE OF GAMES
Friday, May 16
2:30 p.m.: UAB vs. NC State
5:30 p.m.: Chattanooga vs. Georgia

Saturday, May 17
12 p.m.: Winner Game 1 vs. Winner Game 2
2:30 p.m.: Loser Game 1 vs. Loser Game 2 |
5 p.m.: Winner Game 4 vs. Loser Game 3

Sunday, May 18
12 p.m.: Winner Game 3 vs. Winner Game 5
2:30 p.m.: (If Necessary): Winner Game 6 vs. Loser Game 6

**All Times Eastern & Subject To Change**

Should Georgia advance on Friday, they’ll play again on Saturday at noon.

For ticket prices and ordering, visit georgiadogs.com. Currently only all-session ticket packages are available online.

Georgia’s 2014 NFL draft class wasn’t expected to be large, and it certainly played out that way. The Dawgs had just two players drafted – their lowest total since 2000 – and it’s been since 2008 that we had to wait until the 5th round to see a Bulldog selected.

Both the 2000 and 2008 draft results signaled reasons to be excited about the following seasons. The amount of talent returning in 2000 led to Jim Donnan’s giddy and infamous “55 years” quote that set up high expectations for the 2000 season. Georgia’s relatively small 2008 draft class also contributed to high expectations following a Sugar Bowl trip. With Stafford and Moreno headlining a talented core of returning players, it’s no surprise that the 2008 Dawgs started the season ranked as high as #1.

Will similar expectations follow the 2014 draft? There’s a strong returning core again on both sides of the ball. You could point to at least 6-8 players who have reasonable 2015 draft possibilities. Positions like tailback, receiver, and linebacker seem to be stocked with future pros. There do seem to be a few more uncertainties this time around. The 2000 team also featured a new defensive coordinator (thank goodness,) but that group of defenders was more solid from front to back – especially in the secondary. Georgia is more solid at tailback and receiver than it was entering 2000 and perhaps even 2008, but this year’s offense will be replacing a four-year starter at quarterback, three offensive line starters, and dealing with as much uncertainty at the tight end position as we’ve seen from a Mark Richt team. Georgia’s draft numbers should recover next year and the team should compete for an SEC East title, but – thanks in large part to concerns on defense – expectations won’t be as sky-high as they were in 2000 and 2008.

Georgia’s 2014 draft picks:

• TE Arthur Lynch: 5th round to Miami (155 overall)
• QB Aaron Murray: 5th round to Kansas City (163 overall)

Murray was the second SEC quarterback taken in the draft (Manziel was selected in the first round.) Murray was followed immediately by Alabama’s A.J. McCarron and later by LSU’s Zach Mettenberger. Lynch was the only SEC tight end drafted.

Following the draft, several undrafted Bulldog seniors signed free agent deals to attend rookie camps.

• OL Chris Burnette: Tampa
• OL Kenarious Gates: Tampa
• OL Dallas Lee: Atlanta
• ATH/DB Blake Sailors: Washington
• DL Garrison Smith: Miami
• WR Rantavious Wooten: Miami

Three other players who transferred from Georgia ended up with NFL teams:

• QB Zach Mettenberger: drafted in the 6th round by Tennessee
• RB Isaiah Crowell: undrafted free agent deal with Cleveland
• DB Jordan Love: undrafted free agent deal with New England

Georgia’s football team will make its debut on the new SEC Network on September 20. The Dawgs will face Troy with a noon kickoff.

Each SEC school will have a game on the SEC Network over the first four weeks of the season. You can see the complete schedule here.

The SEC Network will be carried by AT&T U-Verse, DISH, and Google Fiber, but we’re still waiting to hear from carriers like Comcast and DirecTV. As Awful Announcing reports, the negotiations are getting a bit ugly. I caught the ad over the weekend that featured an emotional plea from an elderly woman about not being able to watch her grandson. It’s typical of the hardball we see between networks and carriers as they haggle over fees and even placement in the channel lineups. I still expect this to get worked out and for the SEC Network to fill the slot left by CSS in the Comcast lineup, but this “unauthorized” SEC Fans First campaign shows where the battle lines are.