Tennessee Tech coach Bobby Wilder is a big fan of Kirby Smart.

How big?

During a Zoom session with reporters Tuesday, the 31-year veteran of the coaching profession said now that Nick Saban is retired, he considers Smart to be at the top of the heap.

“I truly believe he's the voice of college football right now with Nick Saban retiring. I always feel strongly that you need a voice. You need a strong voice that presents himself in a professional manner that younger coaches can emulate, follow, and listen to,” Wilder said. “I felt that way about Kirby for a long time. I felt that way when he was the coordinator for Coach Saban at Alabama, just his presentation, and how he handles himself under pressure. You watch how he coaches on the sideline, it's very detailed. You watch their sideline, everything's detailed, everything's purposeful, does a really good job with communication with young people and that's an exceptional football program.”

Wilder will receive an up-close look when Tennessee Tech travels to Athens to take on Smart’s top-ranked Bulldogs on Saturday at 2 p.m. (SEC Network+).

“If I was being honest, I would tell you that I'm not thrilled to be headed to Athens, Georgia this weekend so I'll be dishonest and say I'm very excited to be playing a game in Sanford Stadium in front of 93,000,” Wilder said.

As usual, when the Bulldogs host an FCS opponent, it’s a money game for the visitors, a fact Wilder does not deny.

Per an open records request, Georgia is paying Tennessee Tech $550,000 to Saturday’s sacrificial lamb after last week's 34-3 rout of Clemson at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

In many ways, the upcoming contest cannot go much worse for Tennessee Tech than it did in last week’s opener at Middle Tennessee.

After lightning delayed the start of the game for almost three hours, the Golden Eagles lost their starting quarterbacks, the sideline iPads never worked, and coaches’ headsets were out for a while. Still, Tennessee Tech pulled ahead 25-24, before the Blue Raiders rallied back to win 32-25.

“Pretty much everything that could have gone wrong did and we stayed focused on the process of winning,” Wilder said. “But we stayed focused. We’re trying to develop a culture of Tennessee Tech football.”

Wilder said the culture Smart’s built with the Bulldogs in Athens is exactly what he’s trying to do at his school, located in Cookeville, Tenn.

“Another big thing I've always been impressed with a Kirby Smart team is you watch their sideline. When you watch their sideline during a game, everybody has a job. I don't care if it's the assistant coaches. I don't care if it's the trainer, strength coaches, video, ball boys. Everybody has a very detailed, organized role plan that they follow,” Wilder said. “That's the level of detail that we're working to get at here at Tennessee Tech. That's what impresses me the most about Coach Smart. All the watching him from the time he was a coordinator, now a head coach. That's the job that he does. He sets a really good tone for all the other college football coaches.”