Quinn or Arch? Georgia head coach said his team can't 'chase ghosts' on defense

AUSTIN (KXAN) — Legendary football coach John Madden once said, "If you have two quarterbacks, you have none." He meant a team has to commit to one guy calling the signals and using two won't work in the long run. As far as Saturday goes for the Southeastern Conference championship game, Georgia coach Kirby Smart doesn't necessarily believe that.

Smart has seen both Quinn Ewers and Arch Manning in action. Manning entered the Oct. 19 game against the Bulldogs in the second quarter and finished the half amidst some struggles by Ewers, but Ewers returned for the second half. Since then, the Longhorns have used Manning situationally — in red zone plays against Texas A&M — and it's a good bet that Manning will enter the SEC title game at some point in a similar scenario.

Smart knows that, and he's doing all he can to prepare his team for it. Except he knows he can't cover it all.

"There's not enough time in the week to worry about the stress that Texas and Sark's offense puts on you," he said during Thursday's media availability. "There's too much offense they can select from to try to chase ghosts. You have to do it on principle. It would not shock me at all to see both those guys play and Arch be able to play because he has a different element he brings to the game."

It's so late in the season, pretty much everybody has their own bumps, bruises and everything in between. Ewers' ankle still isn't 100%, and that was mostly why Sarkisian introduced the Arch Manning red zone package against the Aggies. He said he had it installed "for a few weeks," but was waiting for the right time to use it.

What Manning didn't do against the Aggies when he came in was throw the ball. Everyone knows how much arm talent he has from when he's filled in for Ewers, so he makes opposing coaches and coordinators defend the entire field and playbook.

"Arch is not just a quarterback run guy. He's a really good athlete and can take off and run at any time, which is the toughest kind to defend," Smart said. "I'd rather have a guy that only runs instead of can do both. He certainly can do both. He opens up the playbook in terms of the things he can do with his feet."

Sarkisian said Ewers' oblique injury in the middle of the season accelerated Manning's development and gave him invaluable experience in case he was again thrust into duty. For competitive advantage, of course, he wanted to keep the Manning red zone packages under his hat for as long as he could, but now he can work off of those and make the playbook a little bit thicker.

"He continues to prepare at a really high level," Sarkisian said. "So inevitably as you work your way through a season, sometimes you got to keep a few things up your sleeve. That's the way it goes."

When asked if he had plans to use Manning during the SEC title game, Sarkisian looked over with a smile and gave a classic coach answer.

"We might."