Stetson Bennett will don a Georgia Bulldogs jersey in a game for the final time on Monday, as he will lead the reigning SEC champions in the 2023 College Football Playoff National Championship Game against TCU.

Bennett bolstered his legacy at Georgia in the Peach Bowl against the Ohio State Buckeyes, anchoring a game-winning drive to send the Bulldogs to the CFP national title game. With the win, the sixth-year senior moved to a 28-3 record as the starting quarterback for the Bulldogs.

Georgia head coach Kirby Smart sure has had plenty of time as of late to marvel at Bennett’s run with the SEC powerhouse, from the passer's time as a walk-on to now being on the doorstep of winning back-to-back national championships. For Smart, he is simply “appreciative” of Bennett.

“You think about the things he and I have been through, decisions made,” Smart said during a press conference on Saturday. “I mean, from the recruitment process to his official visit to what will happen Monday night. I mean, where to begin? … And I'm just appreciative of the way he's handled everything and really what he stands for.”

There have been multiple defining moments from Bennett's run at Georgia so far that stand out to Smart, and when asked during his press conference on Saturday to single out just one such moment, he took a look back at a meeting that he had with the quarterback and his mom.

“I hope that the defining moment is still ahead for him,” Smart said. “But that's a hard question to answer because there's so many moments. I think people will point to the fumble against Alabama. But that's in the past.

“So I would point probably to the moment his mom and he came into my office and said he was leaving to go to junior college and that he wanted to play and that he felt he was good enough to play and he wanted to go play. And he knew there was no guarantee that he was going to play at our place the next season but he knew he could play if he went to Mississippi. They sat in there with complete confidence. And I didn't doubt him. I just didn't know if it was at Georgia. And that conviction they had when they sat in my office should have said, there's something special about this guy.”

A win for Georgia over TCU sure will strengthen Bennett’s case to be recognized as the greatest quarterback in program history.