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Georgia Football

Who is More Likely to Win It All in 2023? Kirby's Georgia Bulldogs, or Nick Saban's Bama?

February 8, 2023
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ATHENS - The question is simple: Which is more likely? That Kirby Smart’s Georgia Bulldogs win a third national title in a row, or Nick Saban’s Crimson Tide winning the national title in 2023?

I’m certain Ohio State and Michigan folks are fully triggered by the question. But, much like the podium at national title games here lately, let’s leave the Buckeyes and Wolverines out of it, and focus on the Dawgs and Tide - the two programs who have won the last three national titles. 

Seven months before the season starts, oddsmakers place the Dawgs (+200) and Tide (+550) as the most likely to win it all in 2023. These are the same odds makers that had the Tide and Buckeyes as the most likely to win it all in 2022. In fact, Bama enterd 2022 as the biggest favorite to win the national title in nearly two decades. 

This year Vegas thinks Georgia, with its set of returning players, is more likely than Saban’s crew to win it all. 

The two programs are not scheduled to play one another in the regular season in 2023 or 2024. Then again, the 2024 SEC schedule could be very in flux with the potential of Texas and Oklahoma coming into the league, and with them a nine-game schedule that would likely come with it.

If Bama and Georgia play in 2023 it will be in a game where a trophy is lifted at the end of it. That’s been more common for the two teams than not. After all, from 2012 until today, Bama and the Dawgs have only played twice in the regular season (2015 and 2020). The remainder of the games have come in either the SEC Championship (2012, 2018 and 2021) or in the College Football National Championship Game (2017 and 2021). 



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Why is Georgia considered by betting world to be more likely to win it all in 2023? Probably a couple of reasons.

First, if the Tide and Dawgs were to play in 2023 to open the season on a neutral field, Georgia would be somewhere between a three- or four-point favorite. Something like that. Second, there has not been as much transition in Athens as in Tuscaloosa this winter. Yes, both programs won’t return quarterbacks that have combined to win a Heisman Trophy, a Sugar Bowl, a Cotton Bowl, a Peach Bowl, an Orange Bowl, two SEC titles and two national titles (Yikes, that’s a lot of firepower). But Georgia, with its return of four of the five linemen that started in the CFP as well as Brock Bowers, is viewed as returning more on the offensive side of the ball than the Tide. Finally, even with Bama’s unreal freshman class coming in 2023, Georgia has at least as much talent if not more than the Tide. 

We’ve not been able to say that over the last decade very often about teams compared to Saban’s Alabama. 

But there’s also the Alabama effect - so to speak - that we’ve seen over the last ten years in college football media and in betting markets. That effect is as follows: If someone starts winning folks find it difficult to believe that they will stop winning. 

And you always stop winning. When is the last time we saw Texas, USC, Nebraska or Miami playing in national title games? That Georgia won a year ago doesn’t necessarily mean the Dawgs will win again this year. However, it is a pretty good indicator that Georgia will likely be good in 2023. College programs don’t typically fall off a cliff like LSU did in 2020.

Alabama returns a lot, too. More than anything what Saban has ingrained in program is that their default is to win. The default may no longer be winning it all - after all, Alabama has only captured one of the last five national titles.

So who is more likely to win it all in 2023?



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