SEC play begins with the Vols and Bulldogs in Neyland Stadium.
A top-15 matchup between conference foes will be decided at 3:30 p.m. ET, with No. 6 Georgia entering a hostile environment with an inexperienced quarterback. No. 15 Tennessee will lean on the arm of Joey Aguilar in his first SEC game of his career.
The Daily Beacon caught up with The Red & Black’s Owen McDaniel to preview the matchup.
*This interview has been lightly edited for clarity*
What are Gunner Stockton’s strengths and weaknesses?
“This season, we’re truly getting to see who he is as a quarterback, because now Georgia’s had a full offseason to kind of shape the offense around him and change the playbook a little bit to fit his style, because he is very different from Carson Beck. He’s definitely a lot more mobile than Beck is.
“He has the record for most rushing touchdowns in a high school career by a quarterback in Georgia high school. He’s not afraid to take off and run. And we’ve already seen so far this season that the playbook has been sort of molded around him. There’s been more designed QB runs and read option plays where he can pull it and keep it himself. And I think he does best when he is kind of on the move.
He’s not super great at like just sitting in the pocket and waiting and going through his reads. He likes to be on the move. Rolling out, and he’s actually very accurate on the run.
“But I would say some of his biggest weaknesses, really the main one, is just confidence right now. I think he’s just, for whatever reason this season he’s a little less confident, just being like the guy in the Georgia offense. We didn’t really see that last season because he was just plugged right in there. And he didn’t have time to think about, like, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m the starting quarterback at Georgia now.’ But I think this season, he’s still trying to get acclimated to that. And he doesn’t have as much confidence in just ripping the ball when he needs to. And that’s kind of manifested itself in like, he’ll like double clutch instead of throwing and have to have to like scramble because he misses an open receiver. I think just going back to what I was saying, like, he just doesn’t love sitting in the pocket. He’s not as confident in his pocket presence. And so that forces him on the run, and then that ultimately eliminates a lot of the options that he can take as the quarterback.”
What have the talks been like in Athens about this being Stockton’s first road game?
“Kirby Smart always says that it’s really difficult to play your first SEC game on the road, and Georgia really got a taste of that last season. Georgia played Kentucky on the road for their first conference game last season and almost lost. It was a one-score game, if I remember correctly. So, I think it’s very similar for Gunner. He is a redshirt junior. It’s his fourth year with the program, but he’s never really been in a situation like that before. I mean, going along with those confidence issues, it’s only going to be worse when you have 100,000 fans screaming at you while you’re trying to go through your reads. And so I think the biggest thing is just that Georgia needs to get a good run game going to help Gunner settle in. I think you’re going to see a lot of screens and short throws to begin the game just to get those nerves out of the way, hopefully. And then I could see the playbook opening up a little bit later on.”
What has been Georgia’s biggest concern to this point in the season?
“A lot of the discourse so far has been around the offensive line. Just there are a lot of new faces there. I think Georgia lost four out of the five starters on the offensive line. So just a lot of the new guys in there who are still trying to build that chemistry and learn that communication that you need them on the offensive line. And you’ve seen that a lot through the first two games. There’s been a couple really big missed assignments, and I think Gunner Stockton has been under way more pressure than he should be against Marshall and Austin Peay. So that’s something where I think that’s a weak point that Tennessee should probably look to attack in this game. And, yeah, I think that’s something where if they’re able to take advantage of that and get Gunner Stockton under a lot of pressure, then maybe Tennessee could finally get it done after like 10 years in a row.”
