ATLANTA — They told the team midway through halftime. Georgia players were going through their normal routine, and this was rather normal. Trailing the game. Needing a big second half. Standard procedure this year.
So this time the story needed a new twist. Some players sensed it when they saw Carson Beck, his right arm hanging by his side, disappear into the training room. Then Gunner Stockton was called to the center of the room, and everyone knew.
“Midway through halftime they (the coaches) told us,” tailback Trevor Etienne said. “They called Gunner up, got him in the middle of the offense, and told him: We need you. We’re behind you. Let’s go get it done.”
Gunner Stockton. The player who led No. 5 Georgia in its 22-19 comeback overtime win vs. No. 2 Texas.
If you had asked the average fan, maybe more than the average, to identify four quarterbacks involved in the SEC championship, they would have known Beck and the two Texas quarterbacks, Quinn Ewers and Arch Manning. If they had to find another, maybe they would have named Jaden Rashada, the fourth-string Georgia quarterback more known for his recruiting saga and suing Florida.
But because this is college football, because this is the wildest Georgia season in a long time, the most consequential quarterback would be, of all people, Gunner Stockton.
“I just want to show everybody that I can play,” Stockton said last April.
GUNNER STOCKTON IS A DAWG 😤🐶 @GeorgiaFootball pic.twitter.com/RBcjvFWfK3
— SEC Network (@SECNetwork) December 8, 2024
He didn’t come out of nowhere. This is not a Stetson Bennett walk-on story. Stockton was a four-star recruit out of Tiger, Ga., who, as a junior in high school, committed to South Carolina, forming a strong relationship with then-Gamecocks offensive coordinator Mike Bobo. But then Bobo moved on, first to Auburn and then to Georgia, and Stockton eventually followed him, though he committed when Todd Monken was Georgia’s offensive coordinator. (Monken, now with the Baltimore Ravens, was at Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Saturday, wearing a Georgia hat.)
When he arrived at Georgia, Stockton sat out his first season and ran scout team, often mimicking the other team’s dual-threat quarterback. Last year Stockton ascended to third on the depth chart, seeing action at the end of three early blowouts. He moved up to No. 2 for the Orange Bowl after Brock Vandagriff transferred. During the blowout win against Florida State, Stockton came in for Beck and threw two touchdown passes.
This year was supposed to offer the chance for more seasoning … and then Georgia’s season of cardiac games happened. Stockton only got passes in against Tennessee Tech and UMass. He watched Beck have an up-and-down-then-back-up season.
Then he watched Beck lying at midfield, at the end of the first half on Saturday, surrounded by trainers. He saw Beck get up, holding his right arm. And at halftime he was told he was going in, with his team trailing 6-3, having amassed all of 75 yards on offense.
It seemed bleak for Georgia.
In fact, it was poetic.
In some ways this remains a haunted building for the Bulldogs. In two consecutive championship games — the 2017 season and 2018 SEC — they lost two consecutive games to Alabama when the backup quarterback — first Tua Tagovailoa, then Jalen Hurts — led comeback victories.
“I was in the stands for that game. The natty,” said Dan Jackson, now a fifth-year senior safety for the Bulldogs. So yes, the flip of fate occurred to Jackson, especially since he knew what was coming with Stockton.
“Gunner Stockton’s a dawg. That showed tonight. Now the whole world knows about him,” Jackson said.
As people around the country Googled Gunner Stockton, he led Georgia on a 10-play, 75-yard touchdown drive, doing some of it with his arm, some of it with his feet. The first touchdown drive of this year’s SEC championship, led by Gunner Stockton.
“Him coming into the game made everybody realize that this is the new juice that we’ve got to come into the second half with,” Georgia guard Tate Ratledge said. “Of course it’s never a good thing when your starting quarterback goes out, but I think it was big for everyone in that locker room to know that everyone believed in him.”
A couple of more drives deep into Texas territory, which resulted in field goals, reinforced the belief. Then the doubt: Facing third-and-long, clinging to a 16-13 lead, Stockton faced a jail-break blitz and tried to throw it away. He instead threw it right at a defender. It would have been a pick-six if not for tight end Lawson Luckie pushing the Longhorn out of bounds.
Georgia’s defense, which bent often but rarely broke in this game, held again in the red zone. The game went to overtime (for a second consecutive week in Georgia’s case) where its defense held again. Stockton and the offense re-took the field, and Bobo put the game in Stockton’s hands: A first-down completion for nine yards, a third-down conversion, a second-down scramble up the middle down to the 4, where Stockton was hit so hard his helmet flew off — but he held onto the ball.
Now it was time for the final play, a chance for Georgia to get the improbable win. And as Georgia players huddled up they looked up and saw … Beck.
Stockton, by rule, had to miss the play because his helmet had come off. So Georgia coaches had Beck do a couple quick practice snaps, then sent Beck and his still-dangling right arm onto the field.
“I can’t say what he said, but it was funny,” Etienne said. “He was just like, ‘Let’s get this, boys.’”
They did. Beck handed to Etienne, who ran it in, and Georgia was the SEC champion.
This team, which barely won at Kentucky, was down 28-0 at Alabama, lost at Ole Miss by 18, only beat Mississippi State by 10, needed eight overtimes to beat Georgia Tech. This team just won the SEC championship, and the first-round College Football Playoff bye that almost certainly comes with it.
What is it like, linebacker Jalon Walker was asked, to sit here and know that after all of that, you won the SEC? Walker paused and then took a dramatic, deep breath.
“There you go. A little relief,” Walker said. “We worked all year long for this opportunity. From the doubt and the haters that counted us out all year long. When we lost, we just know that we’re a resilient team, we’re a team that doesn’t listen to distractions, and we focus on what we need to do. And you see our outcome.”
Head coach Kirby Smart, during the postgame celebration, referred to his team as the “never say die Dawgs.” Stockton, who was not available to the regular media postgame, told ABC, “this is pretty awesome.” He may be able to work on his quotes over the next few weeks, depending on the results of the MRI that Beck will get. Whether it’s time for Beck to heal or for Stockton to get ready, Georgia at least now has until Jan. 1, when it will face an opponent to-be-named in the Sugar Bowl, site of one of the College Football Playoff quarterfinals.
The offense may ultimately be better off with Beck, who has the stronger arm, is a few inches taller, and much more experienced. Then again, this isn’t quite the only time Georgia has had to turn to a quarterback with some running ability from a small town, one who figures out a way to win.
“Gunner is him. He’s that guy,” Etienne said. “I expected nothing less from him. I’m proud of him.”
Maybe it was the latest turn in a wild Georgia season. Maybe it was just a one-day story. Either way, it was quite a story: Gunner Stockton, of all people, to the rescue.
Jackson, the senior safety, summed it up best: “He was ready for the moment.”
(Photo: Jeffrey Vest / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
