Mississippi State Bulldogs

Film Study: why Mississippi State was gashed up the middle vs. Kentucky

Published Jun. 30, 2017 6:28 p.m. ET

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Kentucky absolutely torched Mississippi State on the ground last week. Let’s examine it.

Mississippi State’s run defense has actually been pretty good all year. Believe it or not, but they actually rank 6th in the SEC (154 YPG). The talent is there, but against Kentucky they simply didn’t execute. Poor coaching or bad play – we’ll take a look.

In the first two weeks of the season, MSU’s rush defense held South Alabama and South Carolina both to under 100 yards. While Leonard Fournette and Kamyrn Pettway had big rushing yardage days – 147 and 169 respectively, they were both held well under their YPC average. Fournette is averaging 8.7 but only had 5.3 vs. State; and Pettway is averaging 5.9 but only had 4.3 vs. State. Jamaal Williams of BYU is averaging 5.7 YPC but was held to 2.9 against the Bulldogs.

For the most part, Peter Sirmon’s run D has done well…..then Kentucky steamrolled them. The Wildcats running backs either hit their average (which for Boom Williams is an underrated 7.1) or did well above (Benjamin Snell’s is 5.9 and he had 6.7).

So what went wrong? Let’s go to the video with three examples:

That was a 27 yard gain right up the middle. You’ll see #28, DeAndre Ward, take a horrible angle towards the runner. He comes up the the line of scrimmage as the play develops, and is then chasing Benjamin Snell. He eventually catches up with him, but not before UK had an explosive play to get out of the shadow of their own endzone. The Wildcats did a good job of blocking State’s other linebackers on the play, so it was up to Ward but he took a bad angle and didn’t hustle back to the point of attack.

Next one – a 34 yard rush TD:

To start on this play, UK has spread MSU across the field with four-wide. With our poor secondary, we are pretty much playing Dime with Leo Lewis in space, eight yards from the line of scrimmage and outside the tackle box. The problem on this play is a discouraging lack of effort and awareness by some young guys. First is Jamal Peters who comes off his WR coverage and is heading straight for the RB, but he lets up and the RB blows past him. Second is Leo Lewis who is just standing there watching the play develop. He doesn’t actually react to the play until the RB is one yard past him – and he’s was standing 10 yards to the left. No chance.

Final one – a 20 yard run:

This is just a whiff on the tackle by Gerri Green. The RB is coming right at him and he completely whiffs. Barely gets a hand on him. He should have been stood up with a two or three yard gain but nope.

Conclusion

I don’t know what’s wrong with this defense, but I don’t blame Peter Sirmon for it. Give him and his new defensive coaching staff a chance to gel, and I think this group will be better next year.

There is a youth factor involved, but most of it comes down to bad angles, poor tackling and lack of effort. And most of that is solved with better team chemistry and leadership.

Somehow, someway, this defense has to raise up some leaders who get everyone focused. That’s in the film room so there’s better awareness of developing plays, and it’s on the field with intensity and focus to give great effort.

For the most part, this run defense has done pretty well, but Kentucky was a disaster. And right up the gut where they gained over 80% of their yards.

There is plenty of talent on the defensive side, they just need to get the mental part of the game down. And that’s 90% of it, so when it’s bad the results look like they did against the Wildcats.

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