DESTIN, Fla. — Bo Nix never beat Georgia during his career at Auburn, but the Oregon quarterback could change that in the 2022 season opener.
Bulldogs coach Kirby Smart raved about Nix’s athletic ability, which he’s had to prepare for three times before.
“He’s a great athlete; probably one of the best athletes I’ve ever seen at quarterback in terms of GPS numbers, speed, overall athleticism,” Smart said at SEC Spring Meetings. “He’s grown from being a freshman that was thrown in there to playing under multiple coordinators and going back to a coordinator that he’s familiar with (Kenny Dillingham) should make him comfortable. Very talented.
“We had a lot of draft picks on defense last year and we struggled to get him on the ground. He’s a tremendous player.”
Nix was 21 of 38 for 217 yards with an interception and was sacked four times for a loss of 46 yards during Auburn’s 34-10 loss to Georgia last season. His six other runs gained 30 yards.
In three career games against UGA, Nix has gone 72 of 128 for 639 yards with a touchdown and two interceptions, for a passer rating of 97.6, with 34 carries for 34 yards. He had a higher passer rating against seven SEC teams. His 56.3% completion percentage against Georgia was 5th among the 11 SEC teams he faced during his Auburn career.
In 2020, Georgia sacked Nix three times over 40 pass attempts and just twice over 50 attempts in 2019.
Nix is still competing with Ty Thompson and Jay Butterfield for Oregon’s starting job, though he outperformed the second- and third-year freshmen during UO’s spring game and is the only one of the three signal callers with starting experience.
Oregon and Georgia, the reigning College Football Playoff national champion, play in the Chick-fil-A Kickoff game at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta Sept. 3 (12:30 p.m. PT, ABC) in one of the marquee games of Week 1.
“I want that every year,” Smart said. “I’d love to have an opener of that caliber — that’s the goal, is that your offseason is geared around your conference play, but who do you open with? What kind of excitement can you generate for the offseason? And Oregon gives us that opportunity.”
