Reigning champ Bulldogs kicking off season against Oregon Ducks

ATLANTA — It’s the time of the year Bulldog fans have been waiting for since January. The 2022 college football season is kicking off.

The University of Georgia Bulldogs are coming into the season as the reigning champs after taking home the trophy in January’s College Football Playoff National Championship in an upset win over the Alabama Crimson Tide.

The Indianapolis national championship match-up saw the third-ranked Bulldogs defeat the top-ranked Crimson Tide 33-18.

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Bulldog fans are hoping for another season just like the last one to bring another trophy back to Athens.

The first team standing in the Bulldogs’ way back to the championship game is the University of Oregon Ducks.

The Bulldogs will face off with the Ducks on Saturday, September 3 at 3:30 p.m. at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.

If you were hoping to grab a seat, though, you’re out of luck. In July, officials announced the game was sold out, more than six weeks ahead of the game.

“The game being sold out is certainly no surprise, and I know our team and our fans are excited about playing in Mercedes-Benz Stadium,” Head Coach Kirby Smart told Channel 2′s Alison Mastrangelo. “We’ve only played Oregon once in our history so it will be an outstanding opportunity for both teams.”

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Channel 2 Action News will kick off the festivities with an hour-long UGA kickoff special at 10 a.m. followed by a special hour-long edition of Bulldogs Game Day at 11 a.m. on Channel 2.

The Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game between the Dawgs and the Ducks airs on Channel 2, your official Georgia Bulldogs station, at 3:30 p.m.

In the first matchup between the schools in 1977, the Bulldogs claimed a 27-16 victory at Sanford Stadium.

Georgia is making its third appearance in the game, recently beating North Carolina 33-24 in Kirby Smart’s first game as a head coach in 2016. Meanwhile, Oregon will appear in the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game for the first time in the program’s history.

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The Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game is the nation’s longest-running neutral-site season opener, according to the release. The game has been sold out for 14 of 18 games since its creation in 2008.

The game averages more than 67,000 fans in attendance and more than 87.5 million viewers have watched it on television since 2008, according to the release.

National Champion Georgia Bulldogs return to Athens with big crowds welcoming them home The UGA football team arrives back in Athens after winning the National Championship

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