With less than a minute left in Saturday’s Egg Bowl, Jerious Norwood draped his arm around Sylvester Croom’s Gatorade-soaked shoulders. Their smiles could not have been bigger, as they held one another, savoring every last second of this monumental victory.
Player and coach had finally beaten their archrival, and they did it in a physically dominating way, embarrassing Ole Miss and getting redemption for three straight years of heart ache.
“Mississippi State beating Ole Miss? It couldn’t get any better,” Norwood said after the game.
In his collegiate finale, Norwood tallied 204 yards on 34 carries, helping the Bulldogs (3-8, 1-7) run over the Rebels 35-14 at Scott Field. The Bulldog senior tailback scored four touchdowns in the process of breaking countless school records.
“That was the reason we won the football game,” Croom said of Norwood. “He’s our horse.”
State’s victory acts as a stepping stone for year three of the Sylvester Croom era. Croom said his team’s all-around performance Saturday was the best in his two years of coaching the Bulldogs, even better than State’s win over Florida last season.
“We were never a team last year. Even through all these losses, we were a football team from start to finish this year,” he said. “I told our seniors this is the beginning of our championship run. This was not the end, this was the beginning.”
Norwood, who will shortly begin preparations for January’s Senior Bowl, finished the season with 1,136 yards, the third-highest total in MSU history and the second consecutive year he’s broken the 1,000-yard mark, making him only one of two players in school history to accomplish that feat.
But the laid-back Brandon, native credits everyone except himself.
“I want to give my offensive line all the credit,” he said. “I just want to thank coach Croom for giving me the opportunity to be the starting running back for Mississippi State.”
With 8:30 left in the third quarter, Norwood limped into the locker room with his team only leading 21-14. The gas to MSU’s offensive engine was gone, briefly.
After short treatment for groin and calf cramps, he returned for the Bulldogs’ next possession amid a standing ovation. He then rushed the ball nine times on State’s back-breaking 15-play touchdown drive that started late in the third quarter and ended with 8:43 left in the fourth. The touchdown sealed the Bulldogs’ first Southeastern Conference win of the season and their 38th of the 102-game series.
“I still felt the cramps, but sometimes you have to play through that kind of pain,” said Norwood, who had 109 yards at halftime.
“I knew cramps weren’t going to keep him from playing,” Croom said. “We were going to give him the football until he couldn’t go anymore.”
Norwood’s 34 carries was a career high and the most by a Bulldog since 1998.
“I told Jerious he’s going to be really missed,” said wide receiver Omarr Conner, who caught four balls for a career-high 69 yards. “You can’t replace Jerious Norwood.”
Croom, who said Norwood is definitely NFL material, changed State’s offensive scheme to allow more inside rushes instead of perimeter tosses. It’s something that worked to perfection, as the 25th-ranked Ole Miss defense was trampled by a previously lackluster MSU offense.
“They were real fast,” Norwood said of UM’s defense. “In order to gain yards on them you had to go straight at them … smash-mouth football.”
The Bulldogs did just that, running the ball 56 times and gaining 304 ground yards. Ole Miss had 31.
“Defenses are just far too fast to run that toss,” Croom said. “We ran the same blocking scheme, but we handed the ball off to (Norwood) instead.”
Norwood awarded Conerly Trophy
Norwood received the prestigous Conerly Trophy Wednesday night, beating out Ole Miss’ Patrick Willis and Delta State’s Scott Eyster. The Conerly Trophy is given annually to the state’s best football player.
“It’s been good for me at State,” Norwood told The Clarion-Ledger after the ceremony. “We didn’t win as much as I’d have liked, but I had some individual success, and it was great to be a part of the Mississippi State family.”
Norwood is the second Bulldog to received the trophy. The other MSU recipient was J.J. Johnson in 1998.