Less than a week after offensive coordinator/offensive
line coach Neil Callaway took the UAB head coaching job, head coach
Mark Richt has found a replacement for one of Callaway's jobs.
Late Monday night coach Richt told quarterbacks coach Mike Bobo that
he will be the new offensive coordinator for the Georgia Bulldogs.

"I have enough peace in my mind about our offensive
coordinator and I am naming Mike Bobo as our coordinator effective now or as
soon as coach Callaway leaves," said Richt at practice Tuesday morning.
"He is kind of taking on that role because coach Callaway has a lot to
think about. Mike will be our coordinator and I am real excited about it because
he is definitely ready and I am excited about it."

Bobo called the plays for Georgia's offensive in
the win over Georgia Tech and he will call the plays for the team in the Chick-fil-A
bowl against Virginia Tech.

"Obviously I was excited and thrilled that he had
the confidence in me to get the job done and I will lean heavily on the offensive
staff to keep this thing going that coach Richt has built over the last six
years," said Bobo.

At only 32 years of age, Bobo was becoming a hot offensive
coordinator prospect, but he was hoping to stay in Athens as long as possible.

"This is where I wanted to be and I am not a guy
that was out there looking to move around. I just had triplets and a two-year-old
son on top of that, my wife loves it here, and I working for a great man and
I think coach Richt is one of the best and I am happy to be here," said
Bobo.

When Callaway decided to take the UAB job, Bobo seemed
the logical choice as offensive coordinator because coach Richt has been grooming
him for that position, but Bobo was not sure it would happen this quickly.

"To be honest with you I had not been thinking
about it because we have a big challenge in front of us in Virginia Tech and
trying to get ready for the bowl game against a very tough defense," said
Bobo.

One of the people most excited about coach Bobo's
promotion is freshman quarterback Matthew Stafford.

"I have worked with coach Bobo, I know what he
is thinking, and when he calls a play I know what he is thinking against this
and this," said Stafford. "Coach Bobo is aggressive for sure and
he is really smart when he comes up with a gameplan. He gets input from us and
if we see something when we are in the meetings he tells us to blurt it out
and he will write it down. He is open for help, suggestions, new ideas, and
he is always trying to learn more, and that is what you want out of a guy calling
plays."

Stafford cites the last drive of the Georgia Tech game
as a good example of Bobo's offensive coordinator abilities.

"He is just open to making plays and if the defense
is giving us something like in the last drive against Georgia Tech when they
kept giving us that hitch on the weakside. We kept taking that to Mohamed (Massaquoi).
On the third down before the touchdown on the play where I hit Mo was a play
we had put in the week before just for Georgia Tech," said Stafford about
Bobo's playcalling abilities. "He is pretty gutsy to have confidence
in a play we had run for one week in a third and the game situation. He trusts
the players to execute and that is a good feeling."

Since Bobo was a quarterback in college and the son of
a coach, he understands what it takes to handle the pressure of being an offensive
coordinator in college and Stafford thinks he has tough enough skin for the
job.

"He is a tough dude and he knows what he likes and
how he wants it run. He does a great job of doing it, he gets everyone around
here to buy into it, and that is what you need people who you are working with
to believe in you and they do," said Stafford about Bobo.

As far as the playcalling for the 2007 season goes, Bobo
and Richt have not discussed their plans beyond the bowl game on who will handle
the playcalling responsibilities.

Bobo played for the Bulldogs from 1993-97 as a quarterback,
was an administrative assistant in 1998, a graduate assistant in 1999 before
leaving Athens for one year in 2000 to be the quarterbacks coach at Jacksonville
State. When coach Richt was hired as the head coach of the Bulldogs he brought
Bobo back to Athens to coach the quarterbacks and he has been in Athens ever
since.

"I always wanted to be like my dad a high school
football coach and I saw the effect he had on his players in a small community.
When I got to school and played here I had the opportunity to be a graduate
assistant and went into that role and it snowballed from there," said
Bobo. I was fortunate that coach Richt got hired here and was looking for a
young guy and having played here obviously helped that situation being a Georgia
guy he could bring back on the staff. I have always wanted to coach kids and
it was on Friday nights and now it is on Saturday afternoons and to coach on
this stage is a wonderful opportunity."