Georgia withstands cowbells, Mississippi State to clinch SEC East. Here are 5 takeaways

STARKVILLE, Miss. — Georgia found some resistance in another true road game Saturday night but ultimately left with what it wanted.

The nation's No. 1 team locked up another trip to the SEC championship game after a pair of touchdowns from wide receiver Ladd McConkey early in the second half and rolled to a 45-19 victory over Mississippi State.

A week after it took it to Tennessee in a much-hyped game in Athens, the SEC West Bulldogs and their cowbell clanging fans kept the pressure on with a special teams touchdown to trail by just 5 points at halftime.

McConkey scored on a 70-yard touchdown run and hauled in a 17-yard touchdown catch in the less than six minutes of the third quarter.

Georgia won its fifth SEC East title in coach Kirby Smart’s seven seasons on a frigid night with the kickoff temperature of 40 degrees before 60,352 at Davis Wade Stadium

"We're going to celebrate in the locker room," quarterback Stetson Bennett said in the postgame interview room. "You guys are stealing me from that right now."

Georgia improved to 10-0, 7-0 in the SEC by winning its 10th straight road game, but like its last road game, a 26-22 win, at Missouri on Oct. 1, it was harder than expected.

Here are five takeaways:

Bulldogs king of SEC East again

Georgia put itself in position to do something last year’s national championship team didn’t do—win an SEC championship.

The Bulldogs last won the conference title in 2017 against Auburn, but lost in 2018 to Alabama, 2019 to LSU and 2021 to Alabama. It made up for that by beating the Crimson Tide to win the national title.

Georgia will play LSU on Saturday Dec. 3 at 4 p.m. in Atlanta.

Safety Christopher Smith said there wasn't any celebration for the East title and he was looking to next week's game.

Asked if he could enjoy the accomplishment for 10 minutes, Smith said: "No, we're focused on Kentucky, yeah."

Kamari Lassiter’s tackle on fourth-and-1 at the UGA 8 on pass to Jo’quavious Marks for no gain with 9:54 to go kept Georgia with a comfortable lead.

Georgia’s defense held Mississippi State (6-4, 3-4 SEC) to 310 total yards. Star defensive tackle Jalen Carter set a career-high with 7 tackles including 1 ½ for loss and a sack.

The Bulldogs clinched the East after moving up two spots to No. 1 in the College Football Playoff rankings this week.

Georgia is 5-0 the last two seasons in the regular season playing with the No. 1 ranking. It lost in the SEC championship game last season to the Crimson Tide after being No. 1 in the final CFP ranking.

Under Smart’s contract worth $10.25 million this year, he receives a $100,000 bonus for reaching the SEC championship game. He would get another $200,000 for winning the title game and an additional $500,000 for reaching the four-team playoff.

Bulldogs take gamble, give up punt return touchdown

Smart likes to be aggressive but not playing conservatively at the end of the first half ended up proving costly.

"It backfired on us," Smart said.

With a 17-6 lead and Georgia with the ball at its 20 with 44 seconds, the Bulldogs threw three straight passes.

Bennett had a 7-yard completion to McConkey, threw away a second down pass and his third down pass was dropped by Dominick Blaylock.

Brett Thorson’s punt went 36 yards and Zavion Thomas fielded it at the middle of the field and Kelee Ringo missed a tackle at the 39.

Thomas found room on the right sideline and got a block at the Georgia 40 and was gone for a 63-yard touchdown to make it 17-12. Georgia was trying to protect the punt and didn't have enough speed on the field.

"Bad. Bad. It's as bad as it's been," Smart said. "We discussed it before we went out there: We were going to throw a screen on first down, which is a chance to get it going. You know, you hit Ladd right there, you get it going. The clock's running, and the decision there once we hit Ladd, we thought, 'OK, we're going to go two minute and try to get it going.' "

On third down, Smart said the decision was to run the ball.

"We called a run, but it has an option of throwing it," Smart said. "And that goes back to, you know, maybe us reigning it in some, not putting so much on Stetson. It was a quarterback with the option to throw it. And then once we threw it, now we've got problems. ...It was a very, very poor job of managing the before-the-half situation. It was as bad as I've ever been a part of."

Mississippi State’s 2-point conversion pass failed with Kamari Lassiter in coverage.

Georgia outgained Mississippi State 214-139 in the first half but led by just five.

It was the first punt return for touchdown to go against Georgia since Ace Sanders’ 70 yarder in 2012.

Ladd McConkey finds end zone on ground and in air

Georgia keeps getting big running plays by non-running backs.

The latest came when Georgia desperately needed something good to happen after the home team pulled within a score.

On the second play of the second half, McConkey took an end around, got a block on the edge by big tight end Darnell Washington, eluded a defender and was gone for a 70-yard touchdown run.

"Darnell made a heck of block," McConkey said. "I just cut up and ran for it really."

"They hit that punt return and we came in here and said, 'We've got to keep chopping," Bennett said.

Said Smart: "We thought that would define the second half, to take the crowd out of it if we could get some momentum back."

Tight end Brock Bowers had a 75-yard touchdown run against Kent State and quarterback Stetson Bennett a 64-yard run against Auburn.

McConkey (5 catches for 71 yards) added another touchdown on the pass over the middle from Bennett. He nearly had a third on a 28-yard completion in the left side of the field but he was tackled at the 1-yard line.

Stetson Bennett victorious in return to Mississippi

About 160 miles from Jones College where he went in 2018 to show he was worthy of a scholarship, Bennett threw a season-high 3 touchdown passes and ran for another.

Bennett overcame a pair of interceptions and improved to 24-3 as a starter at Georgia.

He said he was going to talk to some of his friends from Jones who came to the game.

"It was funny the ball boys on the sideline was actually one of my buddies who went to Jones, too," he said. "I'm going to go see him."

The sixth-year senior completed 25 of 37 passes for 289 yards.

He hit Bowers for a 2-yard touchdown for Georgia’s first score, hit McConkey for the 17-yard score and then his play fake froze Mississippi State’s defense and he hit a wide open Washington for a 2-yard touchdown pass with 14:55 to go to make it 38-19. It was Washington's first touchdown of the season.

"Look, look, Stetson understands our offense, and he put us in some really good situations," Smart said. "He made some really good throws. He did have a couple picks, a couple poor decisions he got away with that weren't [picks]. But he made some good throws. The protection needs to be changed, and he got the ball to Ladd, which was really elite down there — the throw to Ladd on the 1 was big. But we're doing some good things offensively — we've just got to be more consistent."

Bennett entered the game with just 3 interceptions on 292 pass attempts.

His first interception came on a deep ball in the first half.

His second on pass over the middle was batted by linebacker Tyrus Wheat who came down the ball at the Georgia 22.

"The dude made a heck of a play," Bennett said. "That's frustrating as all get out."

Two plays later, Will Rogers (29 of 51 for 263 yards, TD) hit a wide open Rufus Harvey on the right side of the end zone. Safety Christopher Smith and nickel back Javon Bullard were closest in coverage.

Bennett scored on a 4-yard touchdown run in the second quarter--tying him for the team lead with 7-. He faked a handoff to Daijun Edwards and deked out safety Collin Duncan

Bennett entered the week tied for the fifth best odds to win the Heisman Trophy at +1200, according to Tipico Sportsbook. Ahead of him: Ohio State quarterback CJ Stroud at +140, Tennessee quarterback Hendon Hooker at +300, Michigan running back Blake Corum at +750, Southern Cal quarterback Caleb Willimas +900. Oregon quarterback Bo Nix was also at +1200.

Back-to-back achievement for Georgia Bulldogs

Georgia is chasing national and SEC titles, but it already has accomplished something that’s never been done before in program history.

Started a season 10-0 in back-to-back years.

The 1980 and 1982 teams both went 11-0 in the regular season, but in between the 1981 team went 10-1 losing to Clemson 13-3 in its third game.

The only other season Georgia started 10-0 was 1946.

Georgia showed no signs of any hangover from the Tennessee win and the withstood the cowbells fairly well after a first offensive snap false start on center Sedrick Van-Pran Granger.

The Bulldogs went uptempo and went 73 yards in 9 plays in more than 4 minutes. Bennett hit Washington for 30 yards and Bowers for 15 on the drive.

Smart thought of doing a “memorial service,” to put the Tennessee win in the past on Monday, but players told him, ‘Coach, you don’t need to do that, we’re over it,” Smart told ESPN’s Scott Van Pelt on Thursday

He said this team’s “driving factor is they really want to win an SEC championship.”

This article originally appeared on Athens Banner-Herald: Georgia football wins SEC East by pulling away from Mississippi State