On paper, the 2018 football season couldn’t have been set up more perfectly for a first-year Southeastern Conference head coach than it was for Joe Moorhead.
The Bulldogs returned a team full of stars that rivaled anything they’ve ever put on a football field. The offense had a fifth-year senior quarterback who was on the verge of setting several SEC and team records in his final year, a veteran offensive line, two stellar running backs and an improved wide receiver group.
More than all of that, the Bulldogs put, unquestionably, the best defensive unit they’ve ever had on the field. There’s the potential for three first-round picks from that side of the ball with All-SEC linemen Jeffery Simmons and Montez Sweat and safety Johnathan Abram. Then there’s the talent at linebacker and cornerback to go along with it that made State the most dominant defense in the country this season.
With all of that, the Bulldogs end the season 8-5 and spent the first day of 2019 in the Outback Bowl blundering away that fifth loss. It makes for a fan base, and even some players, that are scratching their heads wondering how it happened.
“It’s crazy. Even having a good defense, it takes a team to win game. Eight games every season is disappointing, so we’ll try to build from this,” sophomore linebacker Willie Gay said. “It starts with summer and winter workouts, practices, spring ball and fall camp. We’ve got to replace leaders. Those are big shoes to field but we’ve got to step up.”
For MSU, it wasn’t the fact that they lost five games, it was how they lost them.
Let’s begin with the first loss to Kentucky. MSU shot itself in the foot from start to finish in a game that was close heading into the final quarter. They had 16 penalties, most of which were boneheaded plays, that kept the flow of the game in Kentucky’s favor.
By the fourth quarter, a play here and there went Kentucky’s way and the first inexcusable loss came for the Bulldogs.
The next week was most disappointing for State. They invited back in former coach Dan Mullen in a game that had been building for players and fans alike since he left the Bulldogs just days after losing the Egg Bowl against Ole Miss the year before.
MSU had no offensive rhythm in the game but once again was keeping it close. With a 6-3 lead and following a turnover, Moorhead took a shot deep with Fitzgerald to Osirus Mitchell and the wide receiver was breaking wide open. Unfortunately, he dropped a touchdown pass and MSU ultimately lost the game 13-6. That play seemed to swing the momentum of the game.
It’s likely that MSU loses to Alabama no matter what this season, but the defense played well enough in that game to give the Bulldogs a fighting chance. They couldn’t score at all which led to the first shutout for MSU since the Sylvester Croom years.
The LSU game frustrated Bulldogs as MSU played its best defensive game to date despite being put in terrible positions throughout the game. While all four teams are going to finish inside the top 15 with three of those playing in New Years Six games, three of those games felt like they slipped out of MSU’s grasps.
Then there was Jan, 1 where MSU had a laundry list of issues that were in their own control. An unsportsmanlike penalty, a targeting ejection, dropped passes, missed reads, busted coverage and the biggest of all being a dropped touchdown for the lead that was intercepted in the fourth quarter.
Abram put pressure on himself post game, but the game didn’t fall on his shoulders. He had a mess up in coverage for the 75-yard touchdown pass in the first half- what would be the longest play surrendered by the defense all season and the first 50-yard play of the year.
By no means was the defense to blame. MSU gave up 200 yards to the Hawkeyes and surrendered negative 15 yards rushing. They finished as the top scoring and total defense nationally and Abram was at the forefront. He had six tackles, 1.5 tackles for loss and 0.5 sacks to end his career but he wanted that one play back.
“I know that we’re a way better team than that, especially on defense. We did some things that were completely out of character, especially for me,” Abram said. “Busting that coverage is something that I’ve never done in college football. It’s disappointing knowing that we left a lot of plays out there.”
It all ended up ending a season with so much promise on a sour note and left more questions to be answered. Those are questions that Moorhead will have to bring to the forefront in the offseason and correct. Otherwise, the coach is in for some turbulence in Starkville.
And for someone who set the expectations himself when he entered Starkville for the first time and told players to get their ring sizes, there’s no way to spin it but a failure in year one.
“I’d feel a lot better if it was 9-4 after today. You look at the games that we lost and they were all quality opponents. We had opportunities in all of them and didn’t come out on top for different reasons,” Moorhead said. “We won’t be satisfied until we’re 14-0. We had an opportunity to go 9-4 with the bowl game and didn’t finish it off.”
