Kirby Smart's Elements of Sustained Success

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Kirby Smart's Elements of Sustained Success

Kirby Smart
Kirby Smart
One of Kirby Smarts most prominent sayings is having sustained success. On Tuesday during his press conference, Smart broke down what elements go into this aspect of sustained success.
After the National Championship game, Smart addressed the media his message was ‘Georgia football is here to stay.’ That theme appears to have carried over into this season. However, Smart doesn’t just believe it was that statement but that they’ve bought into the program itself and doing things the right way.
‘’The biggest thing we’ve preached to these guys is that pressure is a privilege,” Smart says. “It’s not Superman’s fault if he can fly and he doesn’t take advantage of it.”
Smart goes onto say that it’s the advantages these guys have as players is that they’re really good players. So, they should take advantage of that.
“So if Superman can fly, I say ‘Fly’.  That’s an advantage he has, right?  So our guys, if they can play here, we should play here,” Smart states. “So the standard’s been set to where we should go. You play to the level that you need to play to in order to make yourself better, and the rest will take care of itself.  That’s what last year’s team did.  They practiced the same way they played in the game, and I think that’s hard to find.  So many people want to take it off, take it easy, and you can’t do that.’’
Kirby Smart gives advice to the Georgia defense on fan day
Kirby Smart gives advice to the Georgia defense on fan day
That brings up the topic of sustained success and what goes into that. The first thing Smart notes is that everyone needs to understand it’s not coming because of what happened last season. He stated a few times that last year team and this year’s team are entirely independent of each other.
‘’We’ve got to go out there and practice the right way,” Smart says. “We’ve got to develop talent. We’ve got to be able to avoid injuries.  But if we have injuries, do we have backups prepared to come in and fight and compete?  That’s what camp is about. Camp is about toughness, physical, striking people. You may have some injuries in camp, but we’ve gotta find out what the makeup of this team is.  We’re still really early in that process.’’
Smart appears to have this down to a science, and the team seems to have already bought into it.  Sustained success can come if this team handles the pressure and allows it to be their privilege to become their own form of success.

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Savannah Leigh is a recent graduate of the Grady College of Journalism at the University of Georgia. She is an avid SEC, Dawgs, and college football fan. She also adores her four-year-old black lab, Champ Bailey.