Georgia Shuts Down Trinidad Chambliss in 42-7 Win Over Ole Miss

Trinidad Chambliss accounted for five touchdowns in two games against Georgia last season, and the second of those games knocked the Bulldogs out of the playoff. Saturday night in Oxford looked nothing like either one. Georgia beat Ole Miss 42-7 and held Chambliss without a touchdown pass for the first time in 22 games.

Georgia came in as only a 3.5-point favorite on a Saturday billed as the best college football weekend in a decade, and against a team that had won two of the last three meetings. The most recent was a 39-34 Ole Miss win in the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 1, a College Football Playoff quarterfinal. The Bulldogs scored touchdowns on their first three possessions, and quarterback Gunner Stockton’s 15-yard run late in the second quarter made it 28-0.

Glenn Schumann sent pressure at Trinidad Chambliss

Georgia defensive coordinator Glenn Schumann blitzed more aggressively than he did in either meeting last season, and Ole Miss never found an answer. Trinidad Chambliss went 18-of-34 for 170 yards and threw an interception under pressure. He was sacked four times, lost a fumble when safety Rasean Dinkins hit him from behind and finished with minus-12 rushing yards on nine carries.

The gap between his last two games against Georgia is wide.

• Sugar Bowl on Jan. 1 (362 passing yards, two touchdown passes, a 39-34 Ole Miss win)
• Saturday in Oxford (170 passing yards, no touchdown passes, one interception, four sacks, one lost fumble)

“There’s really only one way to play this guy,” Georgia coach Kirby Smart said after the game.

Smart described it as a choice between two risks. Give Chambliss time and he beats you, or pressure him and he still might. Georgia took the second option and never let go of it, and Smart credited Schumann for the plan, adding that Georgia felt it left a lot of plays on the field against Ole Miss last season.

“Great job by the defensive staff, kids bought into the plan,” Smart said. “We talked about sticking to the plan, sticking to the plan, they stuck to the plan.”

Ole Miss did not score until 10:43 remained in the fourth quarter, and backup Deuce Knight replaced Chambliss with about nine minutes left. Smart had no complaints about losing the shutout.

“I’m not disappointed with it,” Smart said, “because we had some kids that learned a lot of lessons on that last drive.” 

Georgia kept the ball away from Ole Miss

Instead of trading big plays with Trinidad Chambliss, the way it did in last season’s 43-35 and 39-34 games, Georgia made him wait on the sideline. The Bulldogs ran for 295 yards, converted 7 of 12 third downs and held the ball for nearly 35 minutes. Running back Nate Frazier carried 16 times for 107 yards, and wide receiver Craig Dandridge Jr. added a 4-yard touchdown run.

From there, play-action did the rest. Stockton completed 9 of 15 passes for 186 yards and four touchdowns, and three of them went to sophomore receiver Talyn Taylor, who caught four passes for 140 yards with scores of 58, 6 and 65 yards. Georgia outgained Ole Miss 481-252.

“I think Gunner (Stockton) played well, played to a standard,” Smart said in his on-field interview after the game. “The offensive line played to a standard, dominated their front, which is big, and that’s what we wanted to do.”

“That was a big-time win over a big-time team in a big-time environment,” Smart said.

Pete Golding did not see it coming

Georgia moved to 8-1 and 6-1 in the SEC. Ole Miss fell to 6-3 and 4-3, one season after reaching the playoff semifinals. The night turned ugly in the second quarter, when officials briefly stopped play after fans threw items onto the field. A roughing-the-passer penalty wiped out an Ole Miss interception, and a pass interference call on Ole Miss cornerback Jaylon Braxton kept a Georgia scoring drive alive.

Ole Miss coach Pete Golding did not hide from the result afterward, and he said his coaches did not have the team ready to play.

“You always do when you get your butt whooped, but I didn’t see that coming, I’m not going to lie to you,” Golding said.

“Our focus will go back to what we can control,” he said. “We can’t control right now what the playoff committee thinks.” 

The last time Georgia visited Vaught-Hemingway Stadium, in 2024, it lost 28-10. It walked out Saturday with a 35-point win and the end of Ole Miss’s 16-game home winning streak.