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Mississippi State lost to BYU, 28-21 in 2OT. Now let’s peel back the layers to see what grades the Bulldogs get for this game.
OFFENSE
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Fitzgerald is a sophomore and a work-in-progress. He’s going to learn how to read a defense better as time goes on and he gains more experience. Mullen’s track record tells me that will be the case. My main concern are the accuracy issues because that’s more of something you either have or you don’t. He plays hard though and I think he can be developed into a solid SEC quarterback, however, I still want to see Nick Tiano get some action to see how he can play. I really hope he gets that chance the entire 2nd half vs. Samford.
The WR had a tough time getting open and forced Fitz to thread the needle too much. Drops are still a major issue.
Running backs looked a lot better – addition by subtraction with Holloway out.
DEFENSE
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Williams got the all-time BYU record but he really had to work for it. Only 76 yards on 26 carries (2.9 YPC). Considering what Fournette and Pettway did to the MSU defense I was pretty concerned about him, but they did pretty well to limit him.
The secondary held a 6th year senior to 165 yards passing. The only knock against them was a big one: allowing a touchdown on 3rd & Goal from the 15 yard line.
In overtime, State allowed two touchdowns and that’s what is keeping them from getting an A.
SPECIAL TEAMS
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With the game tied 14-14, Mullen elected to go for it on 4th & 2 at the 31 yard line. Fitz ended up tripping over his own feet and falling down short of the line to gain, but it’s the inability to kick a go-ahead field goal right there that hurts. Having a kicker that can hit in inside the 50 is huge and we haven’t had that in a really long time.
Punts were mediocre most of the night, but at least we caught the ball on punt returns from their rugby kicker.
COACHING
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You could say this was as consistent as MSU has played for four quarters all year. I’m not saying they played well for four quarters, but at least it wasn’t another tale of two halves game.
The question moving forward will be: can this staff get the players ready and focused enough to compete in every game? Or at least compete against everyone but Bama – we are good enough to win the next two games but who knows if that will happen.
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