A Tough Road Trip to Starkville (Previewing Auburn at Mississippi State football)

Mississippi State has typically been much tougher at home
(Photo by Acid Reign)

     War Eagle, everybody! It’s time now for the another Auburn game preview! On October 6th, Auburn will visit the Mississippi State Bulldogs. The last 2 seasons, Auburn crushed Mississippi State by scores of 38–14 in Starkville and 49–10 in Auburn. Last year’s blowout was Auburn’s biggest margin over the Bulldogs since 1970 and the Pat Sullivan era.

     The biggest loss for the Bulldogs during this offseason was head coach Dan Mullen, who left to take the top job at Florida. Mullen’s record at Mississippi State was unprecedented, although he did not win any championships. Still, he had this team bowling every year in the toughest division in football. He did a great job of building the MSU brand with his sometimes over the top enthusiasm. His teams played tough and usually above their aggregate star ratings.

     All is not lost, however. MSU made one of the more interesting replacement hires, bringing in Joe Moorhead to coach this team. Moorhead spent the last 2 years as the offensive coordinator at Penn State, and his high-scoring attack made running back Saquon Barkley a household name. Moorhead’s offensive system has been successful at every stop, and he even has head coaching experience and success at Fordham. Mississippi State returns nearly every player of consequence from last season, and Moorhead has a great chance to jump in and have the team play at a high level. If there is a worry about this hire, it would be down the road a few years in recruiting.

     Mississippi State opens the season hosting Stephen F. Austin, then travels to Manhattan, Kansas to take on the K-State Wildcats. The Bulldogs recover at home with Louisiana, then travel to Lexington, Kentucky. Florida has a visit in Starkville before Auburn comes to town. Here’s hoping several physical games have the Bulldogs worn down a bit. Auburn will have played Washington in Atlanta and hosted Alabama State, LSU, Arkansas and Southern Miss before traveling to Mississippi State. The Bulldogs will face a very battle-tested Auburn squad.

     Coach Moorhead will have a chance to start with a bang on offense. Mississippi State returns big quarterback Nick Fitzgerald, who’s one of the more dangerous signal callers in the SEC. Four of five linemen return as well as ace runner Aeris Williams. Where Mississippi State was questionable last season was at the receiver positions. No MSU receiver caught more than 27 balls last season, and the 11.4 yards per catch stat is on the low side. Mississippi State as a team completed only 54 percent of its passes for 6.1 yards per catch.

     Defensively, coordinator Bob Shoop should have talent to work with at every level. Shoop is an interesting hire, a guy with SEC experience. Shoop put together some good defenses with James Franklin at Vanderbilt a few years ago, followed Franklin to Penn State and did well there also. The last 2 seasons, Shoop was the defensive coordinator at Tennessee, and well… last year’s Tennessee defense was absolutely awful. Shoop prefers to run a 4–2–5 defense, which will be a bit different from last year’s 3–4 Todd Grantham look.

     It’s hard to compare special teams units when a new coaching staff comes in that may do things completely differently. Things are further complicated because Auburn has shifted special teams responsibilties around as well. Both units may turn out very differently this year. Mississippi State returns a good kicker but has to find a new starting punter. Mississippi State has veteran return men and was good on both coverage units last season.

Unit matchups after the jump!

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