When Kirby Smart was hired in December of 2015, the Georgia fanbase expected the defense to shine, to dominate, and to help lead the Bulldogs to a National Championship. Check! Check! Check!
Smart, along with coordinators: Mel Tucker, Dan Lanning, Glenn Schumann, as well as other assistants, analysts, and support staff helped paved the way for the Dawgs to reach the top. Since 2016, defensive players from the red and black have won two Butkus Awards, a Jim Thorpe Award, a Chuck Bednarik Award, and an Outland Trophy. Nineteen Dawg defenders that have ended their careers with Georgia have been drafted, and even more that moved on to other teams. Fourteen of the 19 defenders were selected in the last two drafts alone. Also, in the 2022 NFL Draft, Georgia became the first school in the common draft era to have five defensive players taken in the first round.
So while offense and special teams were highlighted in parts one through four of this series, part five deals with the best individual defensive statistics under Smart by a Bulldog player. Remember, this is just under Smart, and not counting stats that these players had under Mark Richt or Bryan McClendon.
Georgia has played a great many players on defense in recent seasons. As a result, individual tackle numbers are not as high as a majority of seasons from the past. That being said, some Bulldogs still posted some pretty good numbers.
Roquan Smith's 137 was the most by a Georgia player in a season since Thomas Davis had 138 in 2003. Many of the Bulldogs listed in the career list also had additional tackles under previous head coaches.
Smith also had eight games in which he had ten or more tackles, including five in 2017. Nakobe Dean had four overall, with three coming last season. Monty Rice had three overall, including two in 2019.
Tackles are one thing, but what about tackles for loss?
When the national media says that Georgia lost too much on defense, they should notice both Nolan Smith and Jalen Carter made this previous list.
A tackle for loss is one thing; a sack is another. Here are the Dawgs that have been a thorn in the quarterback's side.
Now a major goal on defense is forcing a turnover, and these are the Dawgs that excelled at that since 2016.
D'Andre Walker (2018) and Azeez Ojulari (2020) each caused four fumbles in one season to lead the way for the Dawgs in this time. Walker, Ojulari and Lorenzo Carter each had five for their career under Smart.
Carter also had five fumble recoveries in that same time, but one player had more. Richard LeCounte recovered six fumbles as a Bulldog from 2017 to 2020.
LeCounte also did a pretty good job picking off the ball. Where does he fit in with the Bulldog interception leaders?
Not only does Quincy Mauger have two in the 2016 Missouri game mentioned above, but he also had two in the 2014 Missouri game under Richt (he also had a different pronunciation of his last name). Some of the career players above had interceptions for other teams, but Dominick Sanders had all of his picks with the Dawgs. If you combine all coaches, Sanders had 16 interceptions in his career, which is tied for the most by any Bulldog in Georgia history with Jake Scott and Bacarri Rambo.
What about pick-sixes? Georgia tied a school record in 2021 with four in one season. The Bulldogs have had eight since 2016. Eric Stokes is the only one that had two in that period, when he had one against Arkansas and one against Florida in 2020. Other Dawgs to have one in that time include: Maurice Smith, Juwan Taylor, Nakobe Dean and three players returning to the team this upcoming season. Christopher Smith had one against Clemson last season. Jamon Dumas-Johnson last season had his against UAB. The final one was quite memorable. It was Kelee Ringo's 79-yard return with under a minute left in the 2022 CFP Championship game against Alabama.
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