Special feature

How about them Dawgs! Take a look at the mighty Georgia Bulldogs. NBCSports.com

/

Florida edged out Michigan to gain access to the BCS national title game in 2006 and then won it all. A year later, LSU nudged out every two-loss team on the planet to earn a spot in the national championship game and, of course, has the Waterford crystal to prove it.

"If you can navigate this league," LSU coach Les Miles says, "you've got a pretty good chance to be playing in that big game at the end of the season."

What a quick ascent it has been for Georgia: from a team teetering on East Division irrelevance in the SEC to a team expected to make it to the national title game. Doesn't matter that Georgia likely has the toughest schedule in the nation. Or that the Dawgs will travel west of the Mississippi for a nonconference regular-season game (Arizona State) for the first time since 1967.

Or that since January, Georgia has had eight players arrested (six suspended) in what has become an embarrassing side story during what should be a glorious time. Forget that only one starter has been suspended (guard Clint Boling for one game) — the underlying theme is one of uncertainty at the worst possible moment.

Sound familiar? Only this time, SEC punching bag Vandy isn't around to cure the ills.

"The reputation of this team has been damaged, no question," Richt says. "There's no way you can say it hasn't been a distraction."

A distraction, yes. A deterrent? Hardly. No Georgia team has begun a season ranked No. 1 in any poll. No Georgia team in decades has had this much talent — from linebacker Dannell Ellerbe to shutdown cornerback Asher Allen to backup tailback Caleb King, a freshman bruiser who played so well in the spring that Richt says he will find a way to get Moreno and King in the backfield at the same time.

This team proved a year ago it can make everything all right at the moment it seems so wrong.

"Things happen for a reason," says senior defensive tackle Jeff Owens. "Go back to last year, and we shouldn't have been dancing on Vanderbilt's 'V.' Shoot, we probably shouldn't have been dancing against Florida. But what's done is done."

But it most certainly isn't. There's one game that sticks out on Georgia's brutal schedule, a schedule that includes road games against Arizona State, South Carolina, LSU and Auburn. Maybe it's best if Florida coach Urban Meyer — whose Gators are among a handful of teams who will challenge for the national title — explains.

"It was uncalled for," Meyer said this summer of Georgia's end zone celebration.

In his autobiography Urban's Way, due out in September, he explains in detail: "It was a bad deal. It will forever be in the mind of Urban Meyer and our football team. We'll handle it, and it's going to be a big deal."

Or, as Florida offensive tackle Phil Trautwein says, "What goes around comes around."

What's done is done, all right.

What's yet to come is even better.

More news

AP

Slain UConn CB's family wants $5M

CFT: Stabbed to death following an altercation at a school-sponsored dance in October 2009, Jasper Howard‘s parents are seeking significant financial compensation for the parties they believe are at least partly responsible.

CFT: SEC's Slive no fan of plus-one playoff model

Headlines

• Label

Sandusky charity to shut down, transfer programs

CFT: Tennessee TE booted following felony arrest

CFT: Potential Cal starter kicked off team

Friends, fans mourn loss of Stewart

CFT: Ohio St. 'not facing any major ... violations'

CFT: Pitt FB suffers stroke, career likely over

CFT: Notre Dame AD expects to be at playoff table

Judge refuses to delay Sandusky's trial