No. 16 Mississippi State University failed to finish their job in their upset bid against No. 2 University of Alabama.
After leading for a majority of the game and having Davis Wade Stadium rocking going into the fourth quarter, MSU (7-3, 3-3 SEC) had a 21-17 lead and the ball, but was unable to close things out and lost to the Crimson Tide (10-0, 7-0 SEC) by a score of 31-24.
MSU accomplished a lot of the keys they needed to going into the game. They did not turn the ball over and dominated time of possession. They ran the ball for 172 yards. They sacked Alabama quarterback Jalen Hurts five times. These things were not enough.
When asked if MSU did everything it could to win the game in the post-game press conference, head coach Dan Mullen replied with an emphatic “no.”
“As coaches, we have to make sure we are putting our guys in the best position,” Mullen said. “A couple times we didn’t do that today. That was probably the difference in the game right there. If we did everything we could have done, we would have won the game.”
Quarterback Nick Fitzgerald solemnly talked about his emotions after the loss.
“We lost. That’s the reality of it,” Fitzgerald said. “It doesn’t matter who you lost to, it doesn’t matter how much you lose by or anything like that, you lost a football game we feel like we should have won. I feel like we could have won, so I’m disappointed, sad, but can’t lean on it too much, keep moving forward.”

The offense ate up clock with the run game

MSU’s game plan on offense was to control the clock and tempo of the game to wear down Alabama’s defense and keep the MSU defense off the field and rested.
They held the ball for 38 minutes and 56 seconds, compared to Alabama’s time of possession, which was 21 minutes and four seconds.
The Bulldogs accomplished that by running the ball well, gaining 172 yards on 49 carries and not turning the ball over. They also got 22 first downs and were 8-15 on third down.
Aeris Williams led the Bulldog rushing attack with 97 yards on 22 carries and two touchdowns. Fitzgerald also ran the ball well, gaining 66 yards on 21 carries and scored one touchdown.
“We wanted to control the tempo of the game,” Mullen said. “I thought we were able to do that most of the night. We gave up too many explosive plays on the defensive side of the ball.”

Explosive plays haunt MSU

Alabama’s scoring drives came after big plays. Both their touchdowns in the first half came after 60 plus yard catches by Calvin Ridley. Mullen said after the game the aggressiveness of their defense that lead to five sacks and seven tackles for loss can also be their downfall.
“We are not going to change our style or get conservative,” Mullen said. “We will be an attacking-style defense. That is what we are. That is who we are.”
For most of the night that style paid off, but for the times it did not, it really hurt MSU.
Mark McLaurin led the defense with 11 tackles on the night, including 1.5 sacks which were the result of MSU running multiple safety blitzes.
The defense finally wore down in the fourth quarter. Multiple players went down with injuries and eventually the defense got tired. Of the 444 yards Alabama gained in the game, 192 came in the fourth quarter.
The winning play came in the fourth quarter. With 11:02 left in the game, on 4th and four from the MSU 34, Hurts scrambled for 13 yards and Alabama scored two plays later to tie the game at 24.
McLaurin, a junior from Collins, said he was disappointed they could not make the most of their defensive performance from the first three quarters.
“We came out and played very hard,” McLaurin said. “We came out and played the way we did tonight, and we just played lights out. With the big plays and with the end results it just wasn’t what we were expecting.”

Moving forward to Arkansas

MSU will have a week to cope with things and bounce back as they travel to Fayetteville, Arkansas, to play the University of Arkansas (4-6, 1-5 SEC) next weekend. Mullen and Fitzgerald shared the same sentiments about moving forward, they just have to “wake up tomorrow and then move on.”
“We have two more games left in the regular season, must wins, and we have a bowl game so we have to keep moving forward,” Fitzgerald said. “We can’t lean on this one.”
Kickoff is set for 11 a.m. and CBS will broadcast the game.