An Homage to the Spike Squad: UGA's Newest Turnover Award

Throughout the first two weeks of the 2017 season, several teams have introduced their new turnover awards, meaning when a player forces a turnover for the other team that results in them getting the ball back. Miami first showed off a huge gold chain with a “U” medallion for players to wear on the sidelines. This is fitting for them, as the gold chain is quintessential Miami. Other teams like Colorado State and Ole Miss now wear wrestling style championship belts after creating turnovers. However, not all teams have created positive buzz from these new traditions. Tennessee just debuted a big grey trashcan for players to throw balls in after turnovers. After their last season and laughable comments made by head coach, Butch Jones, you would think Tennessee would realize maybe a trashcan is not the best representation of an accomplishment for their team. If anything, they have become the punch line for many jokes among college football.

Georgia, though, may have just one-upped everyone this past Saturday in their game against Notre Dame when Lorenzo Carter sacked the Notre Dame quarterback causing a fumble in the third quarter. Immediately on the sidelines, he was spotted wearing an all gold set of spiked shoulder pads with “savage” written under the G. Later in the game, Davin Bellamy also wore them after causing a fumble that won Georgia the game. 

This is a clear homage to UGA’s Spike Squad, a set of students who line the front row for all sporting events. They have one of the largest followings on Twitter among Georgia fan pages with 15,400 followers. After fans witnessed this new award, social media blew up praising UGA for this inventive and special idea. This is not why they now have coolest turnover award though. It is the coolest because when it comes down to it, this is football and they are football players, not wrestlers or anything else. So what better to award to football players than something football related? It will be interesting to see if other teams will try and do something similar after witnessing the hype UGA received, not only from the huge win, but from this new turnover award.