How Faith Propelled Stetson Bennett IV from Walk-on to Legend as GA Bulldogs Dominate National Championship
The University of Georgia ended their football season Monday night by dominating Texas Christian University, 65-7, and becoming the college football national champions for the second year in a row.
Stetson Bennett IV has led the Bulldogs down the road of victory for the second time in a Cinderella story which has taken him from a walk-on to Offensive MVP, and it's all being credited to the faithfulness of God.
Last year, Bennett's father, Stetson Bennett III, was asked how his son was able to play at Georgia, which was his dream school, and he told a live audience it was because of the Lord.
"Everyone that asks that question," he said. "I tell 'em two things: One, how good the Lord is. And two, just the fact that he never gave up. I've told him his entire life that he can do anything in the world that he wants to do, but he can't just want it, you got to go to work. That's what he did."
Bennett's journey to the field is what his coach, Kirby Smart, calls the "American Dream."
After graduating high school, Bennett only had one offer to play football and it was at Middle Tennessee State.
His dream since he was a kid was to play for the Georgia Bulldogs.
He walked onto the team in 2017 and fought hard and long to become the starting quarterback in 2021.
"Wow. The American dream," Smart told ESPN, last year. "[Stetson Bennett] was Baker Mayfield for one week as a scout team quarterback, and he did a h*** of a job being that. He won over his teammates by the way he performed on the scout team and he just kept getting better. We kept thinking he wasn't good enough, and he kept proving us wrong, over, and over, and over again."
Since taking over as a starter, Bennett has lost only one game. He became a Heisman Trophy finalist this season, and he's now a two-time national champion.
"I didn't dream this," Bennett told ESPN on the stage after being named the Offensive MVP on Monday. "I was just trying to do my job and we ended up here. I don't know."
"The Lord gave him an opportunity to show everybody," his father told the Banner-Herald.
It's a legacy of faith that began with Stetson's great-grandfather, Stetson Bennett Sr.
Bennett Sr. was a farmer who bootlegged moonshine to supplement his family's income, but when he lost a child to pneumonia, he gave his life to Christ and became a preacher.
"Most people don't come to Christ when everything's going great," Bennett III told the Macon Telegraph of his grandfather. "When they've got a great job and a wife that loves them and plenty of money, that's usually not when you come to Christ. It's usually when you're broken."
Bennett III raised Stetson to understand the game of football through the lens of faith.
According to Sports Spectrum, his father read him Nehemiah 4:14 as he prepared for the 2020 preseason. It reads, "Don't be afraid of them. Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome, and fight for your families, your sons and your daughters, your wives and your homes."
And when Stetson moved into position as a starter, his father quoted Ephesians 2:4-5: "But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions — it is by grace you have been saved."
On Monday, Stetson cemented his place as one of the greatest college quarterbacks ever and received a standing ovation in the fourth quarter.
At the end of the game, he was asked about what he would say to his hometown of Blackshear and all the Georgians who believed in him.
"That's God's country," he told ESPN. "It's the greatest place on earth and it made me who I am today."
“That was special. I’ll remember that for the rest of my life.”
— ESPN (@espn) January 10, 2023
Stetson Bennett on receiving a standing ovation in his final college game. #NationalChampionship pic.twitter.com/F8vSno5Ve4
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