UGA Football Linebackers Show Promise After Week One

Kirby Smart had to be pleased with what he saw from his outside linebackers during week one of the season

Quintavius Johnson | Dawg Post

ATHENS - After recording just 20 sacks during the 2025 season, Kirby Smart and the Georgia Bulldogs made it an emphasis this off-season. They had to find ways to get to the quarterback. After the first week of the season the promise of a consistent pass-rush was easy to see. Yes, it was against Tennessee State, but the Bulldogs made play after play in the backfield during their big 63-3 blowout win to open the 2026 season.

In total, the Bulldog defense recorded three sacks and seven more tackles behind the line of scrimmage. Freshman outside linebacker PJ Dean led the team with 1.5 sacks to start his Georgia career. Freshman Elijah Littlejohn also recorded a sack and one TFL. Starting linebacker Chris Cole had half a sack and one tackle for a loss to go along with a pass-breakup in coverage. Raylen Wilson, Justin Williams, Josh Horton and Jordan Hall all recorded a tackle behind the line of scrimmage.

As for the outside linebackers, head coach Kirby Smart told reporters this week that he's happy with the progress that group has made this through fall practice and the first week of the regular season.

According to FanDuel, the Georgia Bulldogs are 40.5-point favorites over Western Kentucky this upcoming weekend.

"I feel good about those guys," Smart told reporters this week. "Those guys have been that way for a while in terms of getting reps and growing. Quintavius Johnson does a good job leading that group and helping them out. Amaris (Williams) is doing it from the meeting room. Chase (Linton) has been in there with them as well and all those guys are getting better. Kamari Brooks, PJ Dean and Darren Ikinnagbon."

Smart told reporters that Chase Linton, a second-year outside linebacker who has started to climb the depth chart, is "week to week". As for the others, returning starters Gabe Harris and Quintavius Johnson will likely see plenty of snaps early against Western Kentucky with other backups also getting involved. With this being the final out of conference game until Georgia Tech in November, look for Smart to get as many younger players in the mix on Saturday as he can. That means more of Brooks and Dean, two impactful freshmen who made an immediate impact in week one.

"He's got great work ethic," Smart said this week about Brooks. "I think it's still yet to be determined how ready he is. I think there's a lot of guys that get battle tested in practices. They’ll get battle tested today. They got battle tested in the first scrimmages to find out where they are. And he missed some time in fall camp with an injury, and he fought back from that and he's really just now coming back from that. So we're trying to grow him and expedite his learning process so he can help us.

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