Georgia’s highly anticipated season-opening game versus Clemson is anticipated to feature one of its best players missing. According to sources, the No. 1 Bulldogs versus the No. 14 Tigers are anticipated to sit standout running back Trevor Etienne, as reported by Matt Zenitz and Richard Johnson for 247Sports and CBS Sports.
As part of an agreement with the prosecutors, the DUI charge was eventually dropped, but Etienne entered a plea of no contest to careless driving and guilty to underage alcohol possession, failure to maintain lane, and window tint violation.
Etienne, the younger brother of former Clemson running back Travis Etienne, is expected to start at running back for Georgia after he ran for 1,458 yards at Florida the previous two seasons, including 753 last year, and nine touchdowns in total.
According to 247Sports, the junior back is the third-ranked running back transfer of the 2024 summer, behind only Quinshon Judkins (Ole Miss to Ohio State) and Damien Martinez (Oregon State to Miami).
Georgia will also be without teammate running back Roderick Robinson, who leads the Bulldogs in return rushes with 196 yards and two scores on 24 carries in the previous season, in addition to Etienne’s injury. Robinson had toe surgery lately, and head coach Kirby Smart described him as “week to week” on Monday.
The Bulldogs will now be relying on two young but skilled running backs, sophomore Brandon Robinson and freshman Nate Frazier. Due to a preseason knee injury, the 5-foot-10, 220-pound Robinson missed the entire previous season but is now back. In 2022, he ran for 330 yards as a freshman and impressed the Bulldogs during autumn training. Frazier was in the same boat as many other highly regarded freshman from Georgia who have lived up to the hype thus far and established themselves as key players the Bulldogs can count on this season.
