Kirby Smart, Bulldogs preview 2026 Missouri football game

Georgia football head coach Kirby Smart and two players, sophomore offensive lineman Dontrell Glover and senior safety Khalil Barnes, spoke with the media on Monday about their upcoming home game against the Missouri Tigers.

No. 1 Georgia (8-1, 6-1 SEC) and Missouri (6-3, 3-3 SEC) will square off on Saturday, November 14 at Sanford Stadium in Athens, Ga. The game will be televised by ABC at 3:30pm ET (Buy Tickets).

Sean McDonough will call the play-by-play, Greg McElroy will provide analysis, while Katie George will report from the sidelines.

Below is a transcript of the Missouri press conference which was provided by UGA.

Head Coach Kirby Smart

Opening Statement…
“We have got a big volleyball announcement. We are trying to pack Steg [Stegeman Coliseum] again and get 10,000 fans in there for the volleyball match versus Tennessee. That match will be Friday night at 7:00 p.m. I know a good group of our guys are going to go over there. We are going to be getting ready for our game, so we’ll bring some guys who want to join over, as well. We need Dawg Nation to show up on Friday and support our volleyball team as they try to have a big match against Tennessee. Veterans Day is Wednesday, obviously, and this is a big game for recognition. You see the apparel, and our guys are fired up to play in honor of Veterans Day and some much they have done for our country. We are moving to Missouri. I have a lot of respect for Eli [Drinkwitz] He is one of my close friends. I think he is one of the best coaches in the country. He is very charismatic. He cares about the game. He cares about the SEC. He cares about these players. He wants the game to be better, and he has been very vocal on a lot of SEC and national issues that I’ve been involved in with him. He does a lot for the game. He does a tremendous job as a coach. I think this is one of his better teams. He has got an elite quarterback, and he’s got good talent surrounding him. He is playing in a tough, brutal league just like we all are, and he has been in some really tight ball games. He has had some close calls, and they’ve got a tremendous team. They’re playing really well on defense and offense. It will be a great challenge for us. I’m glad we get to come home. I hope that our fans will turn out and support and create the same environments we’ve been seeing on the road. We need that same environment when people come to play here. It has to be an advantage for us to play at home in terms of crowd noise and all the things that impact the game. Excited to get ready for these guys today, and that’s what we’ll be focusing on.” 

On the 24-team playoff announcement and end of the SEC Championship game…
“I do not have a real comment. I think we all kind of knew, right? It is not really news that is breaking. It is more, ‘When will they decided to go to 24.’ It sounded like the SEC Championship would go away. I honestly don’t concern myself with that at all, so I don’t have a lot of commentary about it. I think it’s a great, historic game. It’s great for the players, the programs, the fans. The location has been awesome for us. The venue is incredible. All of those things are awesome, but times are changing. As they change, you have to adapt to it.” 

On Missouri QB Austin Simmons…
“His accuracy, his arm strength, and his anticipation of throws. I am a big baseball fan, and he is an elite baseball player and pitcher. His throws are different. They get there really fast. He can whip it out. He can throw it anywhere. I think we all saw the throw he made a couple of weeks ago over the middle. His touch, his timing. He can do it all. He is a really good athlete, so he is in a good system with a tremendous arm with really good wideouts around him. They have done a great job in the run game. They have always done a great job in the run game. I have a lot of respect for him. He came in against us and played with a lot of confidence there at Ole Miss.” 

On S Tyriq Green…
“He does a great job, one of the most fun guys to coach. He’s really quiet and doesn’t say a whole lot. He loves football, and we’re hoping to get him back. We think he would have probably been cleared to play last week. I don’t know that we could have carved a role in such a short time that he was cleared. He’s been working his way back. We’re expecting to have him try to fill some more roles this week. We have to kind of see where he’s at. Sometimes with that injury, it’s the stop and start. It’s the slamming on the brakes that hurt, not the accelerating. We’ll see where he’s at this week.”

On recruiting offensive linemen ready to play as freshmen…
“I don’t know that it’s anything about what we do. It’s our state. They have kids that grow up playing football from the time they’re five years old. These kids have played padded football against some of the best football players in the country all their lives. They come from sophisticated offenses where they get run game, pass game. They’re wise beyond their years. There’s less guys available, so we’re not as deep as we’ve been which forces more of them into a role to play. But Donnie’s [Dontrell Glover] been one of the toughest kids we’ve had. He’s been playing with injuries and banged up and just kind of embodies that group in terms of how they play and the demeanor they play with. He’s a tough kid.”  

On K Peyton Woodring…
“I don’t approach it differently. They’re football players, too. I certainly think you can make a case that some of those guys are more fragile, but he’s not. He’s a multi-sport athlete. He’s been on the mound. He’s had to make tough plays in other sporting events. I have a lot of confidence in Peyton. He makes them in practice. He had a great week last week and really kicked the ball well. We try to give him more opportunities to do that in game-like situations in practice, and he’s done a great job of doing it. He’s just got to go out there and make them, and I’ve got a lot of confidence that he will.”

On Missouri’s run game…
“They’ve got a unique run game. They’ve got some run game that other teams in the conference don’t utilize and don’t use as much. They’ve always done that. Drink [Eli Drinkwitz] has always done that. Whoever his offensive coordinator has been, he’s been very involved in that part of the offense. They have a commitment to the run, which is why they run the ball well. Let’s be honest. There are teams that don’t commit to the run. He’s committed to being stubborn with it. It doesn’t allow you to rush the passer first. It helps your passing game which they have a really good passing game. Their commitment to the run game and downhill runs helps them be who they are. They’ve done a tremendous job of it. They’ve got really good backs. They’ve got a great system.” 

On the seven-up defensive philosophy…
“It’s not just vogue in the NFL. It’s vogue all over. I think the Minnesota Vikings have done a tremendous job of utilizing those, and they’re showing up all over. It creates problems for the offense. It can also create problems for the defense. As Pete [Golding] also mentioned, we did it last year to the tune of a 70-yard touchdown on the first or second play of the second half. It’s not like it’s a perfect scenario. You have to pick and choose when you want to utilize those and how you want to utilize them. The risk-reward is high, high-risk, high-reward. That’s not always good. That can be good and bad. Everybody picks and chooses what they want to do on defense. We’ve tried to have those packages and work them in and also use them on offense because it helps you on offense to defend it.”  

On the decision to pull starters with a big lead…
“It’s more of how comfortable we feel with the flow of the game, how much time is left, who we have available, how healthy guys are, what we’re going to call, how we’re going to call the plays. There’s not a lot that goes into it. We make a decision on the headphones, and we go live with it.” 

On the Missouri defense’s ability to stop the run…
“Physical on the front. They have one of the most disruptive fronts in the league. They’ve got interior D-linemen with six and seven sacks. They’ve got edge guys with six and seven sacks. They’ve got speed, size. They play really hard. They know who they are. They have an identity. Just a lot of respect for how they play, and that’s how you stop a run because you have a mindset. They’ve got one. They do a really good job.”  

On Missouri WR Cayden Lee…
“I love Cayden Lee. He’s a kid that I feel like I’ve seen for so long. He trained with Terrence [Edwards] and getting to see him kind of grow through those years with him. The guy loves football, and he played so well even the last couple years while at Ole Miss. He gave us problems, and then he’s had an outstanding year this year. Just incredible. The catches he’s made, the tough catches, the meaningful catches, the third down catches. They utilize him really well. They have a really good system to utilize his skill set. Just so impressed with a kid that I watched grow up coming to our camps, and he’s just done a tremendous job. I have so much respect for his competitive character and his family. I spoke to him after the Ole Miss game last year. To see what he’s done this year, he’s been really incredible.” 

On the communication between OL Juan Gaston and OL Zykie Helton…
“[Zykie]’s very intelligent, sharp, and so is Juan [Gaston]. Juan is quiet, and he communicates well on the field. Juan understands football. He’s an athlete. He gets concepts. They’re both very bright kids, and having Drew [Bobo] there alongside those guys has been really good.”

On S Khalil Barnes…
“I wasn’t surprised. I didn’t have any expectations. I didn’t know him personally. I knew the kid that was from North Oconee that we didn’t get, that we didn’t take, and he went to Clemson. I knew that, but I didn’t know him personally. I didn’t know a lot about him. I just know that he’s an unbelievable kid. He’s high character. He works hard. He leads. He does everything we ask, and he’s a good football player. It’s hard to say that anything surprised me because I had no set expectations.”

On communicating with other coaches and coordinators across the league…
“Probably not as much as we should. I’m not speaking for my coordinators because they spend more time talking to other people. I think coordinators across our league do talk, do share when they have relationships. I don’t a lot because I don’t have time. At some point, you’re going to play that team, too, so, how much do you want to share information and the potential for us to play a lot of teams still left in our conference. You have to be wary of that.” 

On WR Isiah Canion…
“He’s a work in progress. I thought he really wanted to play two weeks ago against Florida, and I don’t think he was 100%. He was trying to go available. Then, he had a really good week of practice last week, and we said, ‘This guy’s getting closer to 100%.’ He had some good days last week and got to play some more snaps. We weren’t able to get him involved as we wanted to, but we know what’s there. We’re dinged up all across the board at wideout. We have guys all over the place, injured, out, coming back, and we really need him to be back full strength to help us. He gives us so much more than just a wideout because he’s bigger and physical, and he’s older than some of our other guys.” 

On prepping as the number one ranked team…
“The ranking means nothing. Why would we change something based on the ranking? It has nothing to do with what we do. We have a Monday schedule. We have a Tuesday schedule. We have a Wednesday schedule. We have a Thursday schedule. We have a Friday, Saturday, Sunday schedule, and we’re going to follow that schedule no matter what until it’s completely inoperable or we’re just dysfunctional and we can’t function. We’re going to follow that schedule. We don’t really get into the highs and the lows and the rollercoaster rides that you guys go on. We don’t. I don’t mean that to be negative. We just try to stay as even-keeled as we can and just keep getting our roster better.”

On RB Chauncey Bowens…
“He’s not 100%. Just because someone is dressed out and cleared does not mean that they’re able to go out there and play and perform. He’s working his tail off to get back. The fact that he was even available says a lot about his toughness and his want to be there for the team. He’s working hard at that. He’s trying to go. He’s trying to do things. The training staff and the doctors and everybody we’ve met with are comfortable with where he is and what he’s doing, but he is not 100% right now.”

On Missouri’s defensive front creating turnovers…
“They’ve been really elite. They do a great job. They’re one of the few teams in the league ahead of us at taking the ball away, and they’ve also been really good at protecting the ball, as well. They have been elite at that. To say it’s just the front four, I wouldn’t say that. It’s everybody involved. The front four is where you get your sack fumbles, but those backhand guys are primarily the tacklers and the second-level guys and the punch-out guys.”

On the crowd’s impact on the game…
“I’m just trying to encourage them period because it needs to be impactful when we play home. It needs to be hard to play here. I thought the Oklahoma atmosphere was close to that. I just think when you look across the board and you talk to your peers and your opponents in the league, you want to be one of the hardest places to play. I do think we make it hard to play because of the players we put on the field, but we’ve got to do the same thing in the stands in terms of crowd noise, impact, keeping it going for 60 minutes. It becomes a factor in the game. It was hard on our players to communicate at Ole Miss. Now once we seized the momentum, it was much easier. The last time we were at Ole Miss, it was like that the whole game. Alabama was like that the whole game. We want that same environment at home for our guys, and I know our crowd will do it.”

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