The Bulldogs utilized stifling defense and a balanced offensive attack on Saturday to down the Lions of Southeastern Louisiana by a 34-10 margin. After a sluggish start, State dominated the game, racking up more than 400 yards of offense and holding the Lions to only 138.
Junior wide receiver Brandon McRae, who led the Bulldogs with 8 catches for 72 yards, said his team was better prepared for this game than the last, a season-opening loss to Louisiana Tech in Ruston, La.
“We were more focused,” McRae said. “We watched more film. We studied more, and we just went out there and executed.”
The Bulldogs found themselves trailing early when SELA cashed in on good field position to pick up a field goal on its second possession.
The deficit didn’t last long; State took the lead a mere five plays later. Wesley Carroll jump-started the offense with a 50-yard completion to Marcus Green to the SELA 14-yard line, and Anthony Dixon found the end zone on the next play.
The rest of the game proved to be the Bulldog show. State’s defense held the Lions without a first down in the second and third quarters. In the game, the Lions mustered eight first downs, five coming in the fourth quarter.
State’s dominant defensive effort was bolstered by the return of senior All-SEC defensive back Derek Pegues, who missed the Louisiana Tech game
due to suspension.
I slept better this week because [Pegues] was back,” head coach Sylvester Croom said. “He’s the best football player on our team and I don’t hesitate in saying that.”
Croom said Pegues is the quarterback of the defense.
He knows what everybody on that defense is doing,” he said. “When the offense lines up in formation, [Pegues] has a very good idea of what they want to run on that particular play. It’s like having another coach
on the field.”
Junior running back Anthony Dixon gained 80 of State’s 216 rushing yards. More importantly, he rushed for his 24th and 25th career touchdowns, moving him into sole possession of second place on the MSU all-time list.
Dixon said it was special to move into second place, but his goal is the No. 1 spot.
He said while the record is important to him, the success of the team as a whole is more important.
Just keep rolling, that’s what I want to do,” Dixon said. “If we can get the most wins in a season, that’ll be even greater.”
The Lions used a different scheme defensively than MSU had prepared for, which explains in part the Bulldogs’ slow start.
They threw some stuff out there that we didn’t see in practice. They tried to throw us some things we weren’t looking for, and they did a good job of that in the first half. And we took their best blows,” Dixon said. “Once we got in the locker room and redid the game plan, we kinda came out there and got right on them.”
Sophomore quarterback Wesley Carroll had a much better game against SELA than he did in the season opener. He threw two touchdown passes and no interception after throwing three picks a week earlier.
Before the game, Croom made it known that the two-quarterback style the team used against La. Tech was a thing of the past, and Carroll said he
benefitted from that.
It definitely helped me to get into a rhythm easier,” Carroll said. “I definitely felt real confident out there. Everybody knew what they were doing, and everybody was in the right place.”
Despite the good performance, both Croom and Carroll saw room for improvement heading into the SEC schedule.
The fumbles and the penalties, that still bothers me because that has not been characteristic of us,” Croom said. “That’s something we work on a great deal. All I know is we’ll keep working it harder. Going into conference play you can’t give the other team more
opportunities.”
Carroll said the team’s performance was good but not great.
We did not play our best, but we played well. We made some mistakes as a team that we know we can make better and improve on, and that’s just uplifting knowing that we can even do better,” he said.
The Bulldogs are excited to kick off conference play.
“We can’t wait,” Dixon said. “All the SEC games mean something special. You’re competing with the dudes you know and you’ve been competing with for years. It’s gonna be a lot of emotions flaring when we get out there next Saturday
and I can’t wait.”