In home final against the Tigers
Al Davis, the late owner of the Oakland Raiders, once said, “just win baby.”
That would be a welcomed result for the Mississippi State Bulldogs and head coach Mike Leach in today’s regular season final against the Missouri Tigers at Davis Wade Stadium.
Leach has watched the progress out of his team the last several weeks, but nothing would make for a nicer early Christmas present than to see the Bulldogs walk off the field with a victory.
“Well, it means a lot to us all to get a win,” Leach said. “As a core team, this team, with a few exceptions, has never played together before. I think that they’re starting to play together better and better.
“I think that it’s constant improvement meets finishing the deal and having success together. I think that would be huge. I think we’ve been on the threshold of that against some really good teams for the last several weeks.”
Leach was encouraged after back-to-back 31-24 road losses to Georgia and Ole Miss. MSU (2-7) did not perform as well in a 24-10 home loss to Auburn last week, but still had some moments of good play.
Even though the Bulldogs do not have as many wins this season aa Leach would like, he has been proud of the effort.
“We’ve had really good energy and focus on improving,” Leach said. “The one thing I’ve been proud of with these guys is we’ve played really hard. In varying degrees, some teams have more people that can participate than others, but I thought our guys played hard and played hard to the end of, certainly the last –
oh I’d have to add it up – at least three games we’ve played, maybe four.”
MSU has several freshmen producing at key positions, especially on offense.
One of those is Will Rogers
at quarterback, who has completed 199-to-280 pass attempts for 1,533 yards and seven touchdowns.
After battling with graduate transfer K.J. Costello for the starting spot at the beginning of the season, Leach now says that Rogers is his guy behind the center.
“We’re going to stick
with Will and just keep him rolling,” Leach said.
Other Bulldog freshmen Jo’quavious Marks and Jaden Walley have emerged in key roles at running back and wide receiver respectively.
Marks has 47 carries for 170 rushing yards with one touchdown and adds 53 catches for 214 yards. Walley leads MSU with 562 yards and one touchdown receiving.
“He’s a guy that wants the ball all of the time,” Leach said of Walley. “He doesn’t play perfect, but he plays full-steam and he plays aggressive.”
The Bulldogs have to contend with a group of Tigers for the second-straight week at home when the Southeastern Conference Eastern Division version comes to Starkville.
Missouri (5-4) looks to finish the campaign with a winning record and has wins over LSU, Kentucky, South Carolina, Vanderbilt and Arkansas. The Tigers are led by running back Larry Roundtree III with 851 yards rushing on 184 attempts and 12 touchdowns.
Kickoff between MSU and Missouri will be 2:30 p.m. and will be available for viewing on the SEC Alternate Channel.