TAMPA, Fla. — By one measure, Georgia enters this season with the youngest roster in the country. That seems hazardous in a college football world where recent national champions — from Indiana last season to Georgia’s 2021-22 teams — were heavy with experience.Kirby Smart, however, said the youth is by design: Despite the success of other programs that have embraced the transfer portal, Smart is using his money to retain his own recruits.“We’re young, but it’s not an excuse. We’re going to be young every year because we still believe in a high school model,” Smart said Tuesday at SEC media days.While Georgia has taken transfers — including several who may be starters this season — it has largely passed on the big names, exiting bidding wars for players such as receiver Cam Coleman, who went from Auburn to Texas.Georgia retained 26 of 27 members of its 2025 recruiting class, which ranked second nationally and included four five-stars. The only player lost was cornerback Dominick Kelly, a four-star who transferred to Ohio State.Georgia also still has the majority of the 30 players from its 2024 class, including all 11 who were ranked in the top 100.That’s probably why Georgia has a roster with an average age of 19.81, per data compiled by RotoWire. Still, Georgia has a lot of players coming back: seven of its defensive starters, quarterback Gunner Stockton, the two leading rushers and three offensive linemen.That happened because Georgia spent to keep players, including freshmen who didn’t play much last year, rather than replacing them all with experienced transfers.“I choose to retain,” Smart said. “We think that our investment in our player is better than your investment in your player that I would get from you in the portal. So we just keep thinking that if we pour it into our guys, that our development is going to be better than taking a guy that’s second, third, fourth year, that somebody else developed.”Smart also threw shade at coaches (unnamed) who turn over their roster via the portal. He didn’t deny that Georgia also encourages certain players to leave, but it’s not the preferred strategy.“There’s coaches out there that don’t choose to retain. You hear their players choose to leave, but not always. They’re encouraged to leave,” Smart said. “When you’re upgrading at the expense of telling someone they got to go, if that happens, maybe that’s not the culture that’s ethically or morally right, and we don’t really want to do that.”Many of these other programs use the portal due to coaching changes, or quick fixes after poor seasons. Smart, entering his 11th season, has the luxury of being in place for a while and being able to use his program’s success to recruit.Still, the last couple of seasons have shown hints of slippage: Georgia’s 2026 class currently ranks 12th nationally, per the 247Sports composite, and the Bulldogs have missed on some five-star targets. And this year’s freshman class only ranked sixth, the lowest since Smart’s first year.Smart said that access to money is not an issue for his program. It’s a result of choices made on a player-by-player basis, as part of an overarching philosophy.“There’s never been something that I asked our administration to do about a number to go to, to get a player out of the portal or get a player in high school that they weren’t willing to do,” Smart said. “That’s probably more in-house for us philosophically, how we want our roster to look, how we want our money to be spread across. High school players nowadays aren’t any cheaper than portal players. Especially good players. But we put our money where we think it’s best, and to put the best product we can on the field.”Jul 21, 2026Connections: Sports EditionSpot the pattern. Connect the termsFind the hidden link between sports terms