How UGA's defense got 'A lot more confidence and swagger'

[SacFalcFan]

Article

Let's look at the improvement from one year to the next in scoring defense alone: last year we gave up 27 points per game at this point in the season. this year it's 17 points per game.

Now let's look at our body of work up to this point:

Scoring defense as i said us 17 points per game, top 20 in the nation. #4 in the SEC

Rushing defense is 16th in the nation, #4 in the SEC.

Passing defense is 31st in the nation, #6 in the SEC.

Total defense is 15th in the nation, #3 in the SEC.

The above are very positive considering the guys are still getting comfortable in running the scheme. It's a huge improvement over last year at the same point int he season. We have improved a lot in causing turnovers. Last year for the entire season we caused 12 turnovers and had one of the worst turnover ratios in the country. This year we have already caused 11 turnovers and are 28th in the nation (top 3 in the SEC) in turnover ratio.

One big area we need to show improvement is 3rd down conversions. The only team worst than us is South Carolina. We allow 39% conversions.

Overall this is a very good start, but we will get to see how much improved we are facing kentucky in their house saturday night.

[GATX]

Exactly -- this is an encouraging trend, but Kentucky will be a decent test.

Also, the straight up comparison between 2009 and 2010 is slightly flawed because our schedule in 2009 was WAY more difficult.

Either way, I'm behind Grantham and I think he deserves two full season to show what he can do -- recruiting and on the field -- before I'm making any judgments.

[Carter]

Yep the improvement is definitely there... and it has been there from the start, despite our losses. There have been mistakes, blown coverages, over-pursuit opening up running lanes, etc... but overall the defense is playing much better than it ever did under Martinez and crew.

I'm looking forward to seeing this defense next year, honestly. My expectations were not high for our defense to be totally turned around this year, I expected some growing pains and some improvement but nothing along the lines of a top 10 defense right out of the gate. I think next year our players will be much much more comfortable in the schemes and, to a greater extent, more suited to it on a position-by-position basis.

It is interesting to see the numbers and how this defense stacks up half way through this first season. It has improved more than I thought it would, production-wise. I just hate that we had to suffer 4 straight losses before our guys came out looking to impose their will on the other team and be physical every down.