From the locker room

The last question of Mark Richt’s postgame press conference was a simple one: How do you beat these guys?

“You win a game like this,” Richt said. “But we didn’t do it. We’ll be back.”

Georgia, as you doubtlessly know, is now 3 for its last 21 against Florida, and 2-8 under Richt.

Richt started with the perfunctory credit-giving to the opponent. Then he added one for his own team.

“I thought they fought valiantly. I don’t think anyone could question their effort, or question their competitive spirit. It was just one of those games where somebody had to lose. Unfortunately, it was us. But I’m proud of the players and the coaches, and our fans and the band, and everybody else.”

Still, Georgia is now eliminated from contention for the SEC East, which is now a two-way contest between Florida and South Carolina.

So now the goal for the Bulldogs would seem to be getting to bowl eligibility.

“I’m sure that’ll come up,” Richt said. “What have we gotta do, win two out of three? I’m sure we’ll be fighting hard for that.”

Richt said his message to the team now as to “just keep fightin’, just keep grinding.”

“We’ll come back home, and we’ll get back to work,” he said. “We’ll play Idaho State, play as hard as we can for the Georgia people, and then we’ll hook it up the next week.”

A few other postgame notes:

- Aaron Murray, who threw a pick on his first throw, said he may have been a bit too excited to play in his home state.

“I might have been a little bit amped up,” Murray said. “But that’s no excuse.”

-Offensive coordinator Mike Bobo said the play-call on Murray’s overtime interception (which was tipped) was a dig over the middle to A.J. Green.

“We’ll have to look at the film on what happened on that,” Bobo said.

Bobo said Florida blitzed on almost every down, and agreed it was the most pressure Murray has faced all season. But he felt Murray dealt with it well most of the game, with the obvious exception of a few plays.

- Richt said Murray’s second interception, which went off tight end Aron White’s outstretched hands, was “catchable.”

- Washaun Ealey, whose health was a question entering the game, said his knee wasn’t “100 percent,” but was close.

“I tried to fight through it,” Ealey said. “Just go out there when my team needed me and try to make plays.”