INDIANAPOLIS — They’d waited more than 40 years for Monday night, as Georgia last reached this perch when Herschel Walker pranced, Jimmy Carter lived in the White House and Vince Dooley wore a tie on the sideline.
Georgia football popped occasionally under Mark Richt, hit a ceiling with Jim Donnan and toiled in the late years of Ray Goff.
Georgia’s proud fan base accumulated a generation of scar tissue waiting for a national championship, as four decades of futility included the second-and-26 in the 2017 title game against Alabama and this season’s supposed destiny getting bulldozed into SEC title game misery.