Georgia Bulldogs head coach Kirby Smart was briefly teammates with former Tennessee Vols quarterback Peyton Manning in the NFL.

Smart was signed by the Indianapolis Colts after going undrafted in the 1999 NFL Draft.

Manning, of course, was the No. 1 overall pick by the Colts in 1998.

Smart and Manning developed a friendship when they took a visit together to Florida as high school recruits. That friendship was strengthened by Smart’s brief stint with the Colts, which ended before the 1999 NFL regular season began.

Kirby Smart still thinks about the end of his time in the NFL every time he visits the Superdome in New Orleans

Smart joined the Sons and Daughters podcast this week and spoke about his friendship with Manning and the end of his brief NFL career.

“I went to Florida on official visit, and I went with Peyton Manning,” said Smart. “I didn’t know who Peyton Manning was. We were both in high school, and his dad, Archie Manning, was there on the visit. He was with his son, and my dad was with me. And my dad was so enamored, so flabbergasted, and so enthralled that this was Archie Manning. That was everybody’s childhood hero. My dad had played college football at Samford, and Archie had played at Ole Miss. And we were on a visit together, and I’m like, ‘Who’s Archie Manning? Who’s Peyton Manning? I didn’t even know who that was.

“But I met [Peyton] on the visit, and he and I have been very good friends ever since. We played against each other at Tennessee and Georgia. Then I went to the Colts for a little brief stint. I wasn’t good enough (to stay in the NFL), but I was with him then, and we’ve remained friends.”

Smart went on to point out that he still thinks about his final NFL preseason game every time he visits the Superdome in New Orleans.

“We had some really good NFL players who I looked up to and watched play, so I knew it was going to be short lived,” explained Smart. “I didn’t think it would be less than one season. But it’s really cool, I went over to [Peyton] and I said, ‘Hey man, I got cut. I’m out of here.’ And he’s like, ‘Keep in touch, we’ll be in touch.’ And for years, we’ve kept in touch. He’s come to almost all of our Tennessee, Georgia games. He’s always on the sidelines.”

“It was hard,” added Smart of his final NFL game. “Because the last game was in New Orleans, a preseason game. I still remember it every time we play in New Orleans in the Superdome down there. I just think, this is it — this is where I walked off the field for the last time and knew it was over.”

Things ended up working out just fine for Smart. He landed a job on Bobby Bowden’s staff at Florida State before joining Nick Saban’s staff at LSU.

Smart then developed into one of the best defensive coordinators in the sport while working under Saban at Alabama before taking over as Georgia’s head coach in 2016 (where he’s won two national championships and four SEC championships).