Georgia's new assistants are bringing the energy
MIRAMAR BEACH, Fla. – Several factors matter when Kirby Smart hires a new assistant coach to fill vacancies on his staff.
Certainly, being a solid teacher of X’s and O’s is one.
Passion and enthusiasm are part of the equation also, especially on defense where players are expected to play with energy to be successful.
In new co-defensive coordinator and safeties coach Travaris Robinson and defensive backs coach Donte Williams, Smart feels he’s hit the jackpot.
"Yeah, really excited. Both Donte and T-Rob have been tremendous in terms of energy and enthusiasm,” Smart said of the pair, brought in as replacements for Fran Brown and Will Muschamp, respectively.
Fran Brown took the head coaching job at Syracuse. For Muschamp, his decision to step back had everything to do with family reasons. His son Whit is a freshman quarterback at Vanderbilt, and the elder Muschamp wanted more time to spend with him and the rest of his family.
Ironically, Robinson coached for Muschamp at Florida, Auburn and South Carolina before replacing his mentor in Athens after coming over from Alabama earlier this year.
Muschamp is still part of the program, albeit in more of an advisory role as a defensive analyst for the team.
“It’s great having Will there to kind of coach the coaches because it’s like you get your cake and eat it too,” Smart said. “You’ve got Coach Muschamp there for all the value he brings in terms of wealth of knowledge, relationships, knows our team, helps me. So, I didn’t lose any of that.”
Per Bulldog safety Malaki Starks, there’s not a lot of difference between Muschamp and his new position coach.
“If you close your eyes, you’d think Muschamp was talking,” Starks told UGASports and others earlier this year. “I was like ‘Did Muschamp give you a script of like what to say when you first got here? Y’all are saying the same things.’”
Robinson is not afraid to act out his passion in ways that other assistants typically do not do.
During media spring media viewing, Robinson was observed wearing a helmet while conducting drills with his defensive backs.
“I’ve been knowing him since my sophomore year in high school,” cornerback Julian Humphrey said during the spring. “Me and him have a tight relationship. He has us doing these ball drills every day at practice, and it’s helping me better my ball skills.”
Smart believes the pair will continue to thrive in Georgia’s system.
“I gained these two guys that are now on the team and do a tremendous job and they get to go out and go recruiting,” Smart said. “(Muschamp) gets to be around his son more, which I think is really important, too.”
