“Game of the Year” UGA’s comeback victory against Georgia Tech in 8 OTs sets a new record in FBS history
The eight overtimes are the second most for a college football game falling short of the nine OT record set in 2021.
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Carson Beck and Haynes King (Image Credits: L-via Bleacher Report, R-via IMAGO)
The two Georgia football teams went into Saturday’s game hoping to come out as the best College Football side of Atlanta. Right around half-time, the situation was grim for the Bulldogs as they were down 17-0. It looked like Georgia Tech was going to upset the 9-2 Bulldogs.
However, things took a drastic turn in the second half as the Georgia Bulldogs made a solid comeback. The game then wound up going to overtime but the competition between these two teams resulted in a back-and-forth another seven times until the Bulldogs won 44-42.
With this, the game set a new record for the second-most overtimes in college football history. It overtook the previous record set by Eastern Kentucky against Bowling Green in 2022.
The matchup went into seven overtimes with the former winning the game 59-57. Interestingly enough, there have been multiple games in the past that have gone into seven overtimes.
The Georgia Bulldogs vs. Georgia Tech game went on for four-and-a-half hours
The game quite literally lasted for two days for viewers on the East Coast. The game was a rollercoaster ride for fans of the Bulldogs and was one filled with controversy over calls made by the referees. The dispute arose in the fourth quarter when the score was 27-20 in favor of the Yellow Jackets.
Georgia Tech was on the verge of closing the game out until QB Haynes King fumbled the ball after he took a hard hit from Bulldogs’ Dan Jackson. The ball was recovered by the opponents and resulted in a game-tying drive.
Fans and viewers with no bias believed the hit on King should have been targeting him as he was hit by the defender with his head lowered and right on the facemask.
CLEAN OLD FASHIONED 8️⃣
— ESPN (@espn) November 30, 2024
UGA COMES BACK TO WIN IN 8OT‼️ pic.twitter.com/QpMIXjgJLi
The Bulldogs-Yellow Jackets matchup fell short of matching the FBS record for Most OTs in a game, a record set in the 2021 game between Illinois and Penn State which went into nine overtimes, yet the score of that game was surprisingly low at 20-18.
Bulldogs Head Coach Kirby Smart and his Yellow Jackets counterpart Brent Key had used all the weapons in their arsenal around the 8th overtime, but UGA won ultimately.
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Sumedh Joshi
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