It came to them a little late in the season, but for the Mississippi State football team, last week’s bye was worth the wait.The Bulldogs’ season started some 12 weeks ago, in the sweltering summer heat. Over the next three months, day in and day out, the players have been asking their bodies to absorb and distribute a massive amount of physical punishment.
So it comes as no surprise that when the schedule showed no game last weekend, the Bulldogs could not have been happier.
“It felt good,” sophomore running back Anthony Dixon said. “It gave me the chance to relax and get away from football for awhile. It also gave me the chance to rest my legs and knees.”
But it hasn’t actually been 12 straight weeks of football for the State players.
During the week of the Kentucky game, Croom gave his players the following Monday off.
While it may not seem like much, the players appreciated the gesture so much that Dixon said they were hoping they might see the kinder side of their coach once again.
“We were all hoping we’d get Monday off again this week. But with our head coach, we know that wasn’t going to fly too many times,” Dixon said.
As the team returned to practice this week, the jokes have been put aside and the team is trying to regain focus as it heads into its final three games.
After Monday’s practice, Croom was quick to point out the sluggish play of his offensive and defensive lines.
With it only being the first practice after the open weekend, Croom could have expected as much, but he knows if his team is going to achieve its goal of making it to the post-season, they have to regain focus immediately.
Only being one win away from becoming bowl-eligible, it would be easy for the players to become distracted with talks of bowl games and praise that comes along, but Croom said he’s pleased to see his team isn’t listening to the outside factors.
“The one thing I really appreciate and respect about this team is how we’ve stayed in the present, focusing on the moment and taking care of one day at a time,” Croom said. “We take it one day at a time, not wasting one day in the act of getting better. ”
With Alabama as State’s next opponent on the schedule, the Bulldogs are forced to stay in the present.
The Crimson Tide will be the fourth consecutive ranked team State has faced, and the road doesn’t get easier with a trip to Arkansas next week, before finishing the season with in-state rival Ole Miss.
While at home visiting his family, Dixon said it was hard not to stay focused on the task at hand; not because he wanted to, but because his friends and family wouldn’t let him think of anything else.
“It was all about Mississippi State. It was like I was still up here,” he said. “People wanted to know what we’re going to do. It helped me because it was a constant reminder of what I have to do back up here.”
For the senior class, such success has been a long time in the making.
Being recruited to a program rebuilding from NCAA probation hasn’t been easy for this year’s nine seniors. In the past for every bit of success, there has been failure to accompany it.
But in a conversation senior linebacker Gabe O’Neal recalls having with Croom, that makes the wait well worth it.
“I remember him saying this recruiting class was going to go to a bowl game,” O’Neal said. “Making a promise like that is big, coming into a program you have to rebuild. I can see all the pieces coming together.”
Fellow senior Titus Brown said he remembers a similar promise, and said the team doesn’t plan on letting talk of bowls corrupt them.
Instead they plan to use it for inspiration.
“We’re not going to let it be a distraction, but we’re going to use it as motivation,” Brown said. “When you have a game where somebody is standing in the way of your goals, I think you try to go out there and overcome those obstacles.