When No. 1 Georgia and No. 11 Kentucky clash on Saturday, the two sides will find that they have more in common than meets the eye. Both teams sit atop the SEC East at 6-0 this season, and have a quarterback room made of transfers.
For both the Bulldogs and the Wildcats, the path to finding a starting quarterback came through the transfer portal this season.
The Bulldogs’ transfer duo
In Georgia’s case, starting quarterback JT Daniels transferred from the University of Southern California before the 2020 season. Daniels had a knee injury when he joined the Bulldogs. However, after working back to full strength, the quarterback earned the starting position midway through the season.
After posting 1,231 total passing yards in 2020, it was clear that Daniels would be Georgia’s starting quarterback against Clemson to start the 2021 season.
Daniels’ decision to choose the Bulldogs was looking promising, but in his eyes it was always going to be Georgia.
“It’s really difficult to beat Georgia,” Daniels said at SEC Media Days in July. “It’s a top-five team, good school and great staff. I couldn’t find a reason not to come here.”
Despite starting and winning against then-No. 3 Clemson to start the season, it has not been Daniels that has seen the most time under center for the Bulldogs. Stetson Bennett, a senior, has played in five games for Georgia, starting in three.
Bennett has quickly become a household name for the Bulldogs and despite coming to Georgia as a freshman, he too was a product of the transfer portal.
After Bennett’s freshman year in Athens he transferred to Jones College, a community college in Mississippi. He then went back into the portal which landed him back at Georgia.
Wildcats find their leader
For Kentucky, the transfer portal struck before the 2020 season when the Wildcats landed Auburn transfer Joey Gatewood. Gatewood played in seven games over the year, including a start against Georgia.
This year, Will Levis transferred to Kentucky after three seasons at Penn State. He was named the starting quarterback before the season started and has made the most of it, throwing for 1,134 yards through six games.
Levis’ passing ability is something that Stoops said he has been looking for and will provide plenty of opportunities for Kentucky to grow. The impact Levis and others have had on the team has opened Stoops’ eyes to the power of the transfer portal.
The landscape in college football has been changing and Stoops has worked to change with it. The transfer portal has forced teams to adapt, but Stoops sees it as a way to grow the Kentucky program.
“I said it when I got to Kentucky that we were going to recruit, we were going to develop, we were going to compete and I wanted to take this program to national prominence and people laughed at me,” Stoops said. “We’re not there yet, but we’re on our way.”