Prior to Monday’s press conference to preview Saturday’s game against Florida (3:30 p.m., CBS), officials from both universities released a joint statement on the status of keeping the game in Jacksonville.

You can read that story here.

The decision of what ultimately to do after the current contract has certainly inspired much debate, especially after Bulldog head coach Kirby Smart acknowledged he’d like to see the game move to home-and-home.

Apparently, he’s not the only one.

Safety Christopher Smith and quarterback Stetson Bennett were also asked their opinions on the game.

“I like playing in Jacksonville, but I’d personally like the game to be home-and-home. It would bring a different feel,” Smith said. “I’ve never had the opportunity to play in Florida’s stadium or anything like that; it’s something that I always wanted. But I think it would be great to have a home-and-home, then maybe a game in Jacksonville, something like that.”

A south Georgia native, Bennett had a bit of a different take.

While he agrees with Smith that “it would be cool” to play in Gainesville, he’s not sure if moving the game permanently is the answer.

“The grass is always greener. But it’s hard to say,” Bennett said. “I don’t really know what that would mean for Jacksonville, Athens, Gainesville the city and all that stuff, but it would be cool to play down there. But as far as permanently, I don’t know.”

Although Smart certainly wants to beat Florida in the worst way, he is a big fan of Gator head coach Billy Napier.

Smart and Napier served together on the staff at Alabama and have remained close friends.

“He's very thorough. He's an extremely hard worker. Great husband and father. He's a good leader of men. And I knew from the first time he got to Alabama, I don't know what year it was, but whatever year he got there, he was going to be really good, because he paid attention to detail,” Smart said. “He took a lot of notes. He was just really smart. You knew he was there to learn. I think he capitalized on his time he spent there to look at football from a different perspective, maybe from what he looked at previously.

"He was really successful at ULL. Which is a great school, great location, a lot of good football players. But they won a lot of football games with him there.”

Like Smart, Napier is the son of a former high school coach.

“Being a high school coach's son in this state, we grew up very similar,” Smart said.

… On what he sees as the improvements made by Florida quarterback Anthony Richardson: “He's grown a lot, and he's gotten considerably better to me during this season. Like, from the start of the season, game one, you watch every game in sequence and you say, man, this guy is growing and getting better,” Smart said. “They don't just limit things for him. Like, they put a lot of shift motion, they put a lot of things on top of him to handle and he manages those well. The toughest thing dealing with Anthony Richardson is how you affect him. You’ve got to be careful. Some of the runs he's had have been better than backs have across the country. He’s had 60 and 70-yard runs and can take off at any point in time and you don't know who's going to have him or who can get him down. He's got elite arm talent in terms of strength. They clean things up for him on a lot of reads and does a really nice job.”

…Smart on Florida’s defensive front: “Extremely disruptive. You know, the size and girth in the middle is what you want in the SEC, to control run games and control the A and B gaps,” Smart said. “They still got the edge guys with Brenton (Cox), being probably the most disruptive guy that we've played in terms of just violence, striking, knock-back, setting edges, affecting the quarterback. He's a game-breaker at that.”

…Recruits will be able to attends Saturday’s game as guests of both schools. But other than that, Smart said there’s nothing he will be able to do: “We're allowed to use tickets, but we can't host them. We can't do anything. So, I never understood … I never understand ... what would we do with them?” Smart said. “We can't legally see them. We can't talk to them, we can't host them or visit with them. We can say, There's a ticket at the gate, enjoy the game. That’s really, all we can do. We'll do that. We'll have some kids go to the game.”