ATHENS, Ga. – There will undoubtedly be a knot in Kirby Smart’s stomach.
He’s one of the most intense, driven and successful coaches in college football. But he’s also human and forever a son.
His Georgia team returns to New Orleans on New Year’s Day to face Ole Miss in the Sugar Bowl, the quarterfinal round of the College Football Playoff. It was almost a year ago that Smart lost his father, Sonny Smart, who was walking in New Orleans on New Year’s Eve, fell and broke his hip and died four days later after complications from surgery. He was 76.
“Yeah, a lot of tough memories. It’s the first time any of us have been back, my whole family,” Smart told On3. “It just happened so fast, all of it. We’re there getting ready for the game. He’s out walking. He falls. Then you have that terrible terrorist attack. They push the game back, push his surgery back and then he’s gone.
“It was hard to get through, but the way we all got through it is because of him and what he taught us about tough times and how to handle them.
“I am who I am because of my father.”
Who Smart is, at his core, is a fighter, and that’s just the beginning. He’s convicted, never in need of motivation and consumed with the unrelenting pursuit of excellence.
“I’m always looking at what else can we do,” said Smart, who guided his alma mater to back-to-back national championships in 2021 and 2022 and SEC titles each of the past two years.
Over the past five seasons, Georgia’s 65 wins lead all FBS teams. The next closest is Ohio State with 59. The Bulldogs have won at least 11 games in all five seasons.
And while this is hardly the most talented team Smart has had at Georgia, it’s as focused, close and perhaps the hardest working of any of Smart’s teams. Granted, this version of the Bulldogs hasn’t always mauled its opponents the way those 2021, 2022 and 2023 teams often did, but the Bulldogs have been “hard to kill,” especially in key moments.
“They haven’t blinked, and so much of that comes from the way they’ve prepared,” Smart said. “This team loves to practice, loves to compete. They want those situations where the game is hanging in the balance.”
A priority this season for Smart and the program was to get back to Georgia’s roots, specifically running the ball more consistently and stopping the run. The Bulldogs lost four starters on the offensive line from a year ago and had three defenders selected in the first round of the 2025 NFL draft. Still, Georgia went from averaging 124.4 rushing yards per game in 2024 to 186.6 yards this season, and on defense, allowed just 79.2 rushing yards per game (fourth nationally) compared to 129.6 yards per game a year ago.
“That’s our identity, and these kids bought into that,” Smart said. “For us to be where we wanted to be, we had to be better in both areas, and you could see that mentality take shape on the practice field.”
Smart has never been one to dwell on the past. It’s not in his DNA. But when the Georgia team plane lands in New Orleans next Monday, there will be some memories he won’t be able to escape.
Georgia lost 23-10 to Notre Dame in the Sugar Bowl last year, a game played on Jan. 2 in the Superdome. Smart’s father died less than two days later at 12:15 a.m. on Jan. 4. The family never went back home to Georgia and were all with Sonny when he passed. Smart rushed to the hospital to be with his father soon after the game, one that saw the Bulldogs turn it over twice and give up a kickoff return for a touchdown. It was also Gunner Stockton’s first career start at quarterback after taking over for the injured Carson Beck in the SEC championship game.
“None of it takes anything away from Notre Dame,” said Smart, who had a chance to visit with his father on New Year’s Day in the hospital. “They had an incredible season and team. We got beat by a really good football team that played better than us that day. Yes, it was awkward, but they had to wait a day later to play the game, too. It’s not why we lost the game.”
Sonny Smart, a longtime educator and coach, didn’t raise his son to make excuses. Smart played for his dad at Bainbridge High School and soaked in the life lessons as much as he did the football lessons.
“My father was a quiet man, a leader by example, and when things didn’t go the way you wanted them to, you learned in watching him that you own those things,” Smart said. “You correct those things and never dump them off on somebody else.”
Those life lessons will be front and center on Smart’s mind next week the first time he walks into the Superdome, the first time he passes through the French Quarter and should he pass the Ochsner Medical Center, where the family gathered to spend Sonny Smart’s final hours.
There will be in Smart’s words “moments” that take him back to a year ago.
“I’m glad we could all be together with him when he passed, but then there’s the really hard part, going to the funeral home and picking everything out,” Smart said. “We had to get everything finalized right there in New Orleans.”
It will be especially emotional for Smart’s mother, Sharon, who’s coming to the Sugar Bowl with Smart’s sister, Kendall. Sonny and Sharon were married for 52 years, and as fate would have it, honeymooned in New Orleans.
“My mom is the one I think about the most going back,” Smart said. “I know my dad is in a better place, and yeah, the first time I walk into the Superdome or land at the airport, I’ll think back to last year. But for her, it’s very emotional. She did all the bowl events with my father, and this will be the first time she’s going to one of these without him. I’m glad my sister can be with her.”
Coaches, certainly the good ones, never quit evolving and never quit growing. But there is no manual or blueprint for a coach when you’re about to lead your team into the most important game of the season and your father is across town in a hospital undergoing major surgery.
As disappointing as the Notre Dame loss was last season for the Georgia players, seeing the way Smart pushed through such a difficult ordeal only reinforced what they already knew about their coach.
“I know his father is smiling down at him because he handled that like a true man, like a true ‘G’ man,” redshirt junior defensive lineman Christen Miller said. “That’s why I love Coach Smart because he held it together, bro. You could tell he was going through a lot and maybe wasn’t his crazy self. There were so many distractions, but he held it together, coached us hard and had us ready.
“We didn’t win, but I know his dad was proud of him.”
Smart, who turns 50 on Tuesday, would love nothing more than to re-write the Sugar Bowl story now that he’s back a year later, not so much for him, but for this team.
“That would be great, but it would be more about these kids,” Smart said. “They’ve wanted it so bad and practiced so hard to get here. You want to see them be rewarded, to keep playing.”
Even with the heart-wrenching memories from a year ago, Smart has an enduring connection with New Orleans, the Sugar Bowl and the Superdome.
The last NFL game he ever played in with the Indianapolis Colts during the 1999 preseason before being cut was against the New Orleans Saints in the Superdome.
And when it comes to past Sugar Bowls in New Orleans and postseason games played in the Superdome, Smart has his own personal scrapbook.
“That’s a place that I seem to keep coming back to,” he said. “It’s weird how all things come full circle. My mom and dad had their honeymoon there. Dad died there. I played my last NFL game there.
“And I’ve been a part of some mammoth games there.”
Some good and some not so good.
While at Alabama, Smart was on the losing end to Ohio State in the first playoff during the 2014 season.
“The only playoff game we lost when I was with Nick was to Ohio State when Ezekial Elliott beat us, and then Utah whipped our butts in the (2009) Sugar Bowl after we lost to Florida in the SEC championship game,” Smart recalled.
One of Smart’s fondest post-game moments with his dad came at the Superdome. He was Alabama’s defensive coordinator under Saban in 2011 when Alabama and LSU played twice that year in No. 1 vs. No. 2 showdowns. The Crimson Tide won in the rematch when they smothered the Tigers defensively in a 21-0 shutout that saw Alabama limit LSU to 92 total yards.
Afterward, Smart said his dad gave him one of the biggest and longest hugs he’s ever given him.
“Dad wasn’t one to give compliments just to give them, but that’s as happy as I’ve seen him after a game,” Smart said. “I’ll never forget it. He came up to me and said that it was one of the best defensive performances he’s ever seen. It was unbelievable, one of those moments you’ll always hold onto.”
Smart and his Bulldogs are hellbent on creating some more of those moments next week in the Big Easy.