Countdown to Kickoff Day 17: #34 Mississippi Bulldogs

The Bulldogs are coming off an eight win regular season that ended in a tragedy with the passing of the late great Mike Leach.

Quick note about "The Pirate" himself. I fell in love with his air raid style offense when he was at Washington State (show me a fan of the game that doesn’t like to see the ball thrown 60 times a game and I’ll show you a loser) and quickly learned to love him as a person once I started following him. Rest in Peace to the one and only. There wasn’t, isn’t and never will be anyone like Coach Leach.

Things will be different in Starkville this year. Not only is there a first year head coach in Zach Arnett, but there is also a new offensive coordinator, Kevin Barbay, who loves to run a well-balanced offensive attack…the opposite approach to what was working for this team that went 9-4 after their bowl game victory last season against Illinois in January. An interesting move, with the chance to be effective, but also to completely blow up in the Bulldogs face. Only time will tell.

The good news for the offense is that they return a handful of talent, including their star senior quarterback, Will Rogers. Rogers holds the passing record already at Mississippi State and is looking to add on that so that nobody ever catches him. Now, a big part of his name being in the record books is because of the offensive Leach ran, throwing the ball 48.7 times a game last year which ranks #1 in the nation. That will NOT be the case this year as the bulldogs will also rely heavily on their run game for whatever reason. They have a solid running back in Jo’quavious Marks, and a great offensive line to create holes for him so this new offense could work, but it will certainly look a lot different and will take a couple games to get used to for the players.

Defensively, MSU will be stacked. Arnett is a defensive minded coach who elevated linebackers coach Matt Brock to be defensive coordinator when Arnett got the head coaching position. They also will be very experienced and bring back a lot of talent that ranked in the top of the SEC last year in many defensive statistics. They will be fun to watch.

Prediction: 8-4.

How Many Games Will MSU Win In 2023?

• 8 or more
• 7 or less