“I’ve never told anybody this, but I was on a recruiting trip here one time when I was at Alabama and I stopped at Hardee’s and ordered some biscuits, sat down and watched people go by and it crossed my mind, ‘What would it be like to coach here?'”Sylvester Croom isn’t wondering anymore. As the sun began beaming through the blinds in his office, the tone of his voice changed. It was time to talk business.
Today the coach is trying to pass on the lessons he has learned to the Mississippi State football team. Hard work, discipline and the will to keep pushing forward are principles he says he is trying to instill in his players. Those same principles inspired the way not only he lives his life today, but how he coaches the team.
Croom’s coaching style was inspired in large part by his father and his former coach at Alabama, Paul “Bear” Bryant, whom he says were the two most influential people in his life. Though they’ve passed away, the coach says he still feels a connection to them.
“Even now their words, their spirits – I seem like I communicate with them in a spiritual way each and every day,” Croom said. “I still think, ‘What would they think about this decision, what would they think about this action, what would they think about me as a person?’ They meant so much to me and I had so much respect for them that in my mind, if I feel like they approve, I really don’t care a whole lot about what anybody else thinks because those are the two greatest people I ever knew.”
To the coaching staff, Croom leads the program like a family man, always with open ears and supportive words.
“The thing about coach is that in the staff room or the field [when] we conduct business, it’s kind of a family environment,” said assistant head coach Woody McCorvey, who has known Croom for three decades. “Everybody feels like they have the right to voice their opinions. Even though he’s the head coach, he’s going to listen. That’s what is making the working relationship here so good. He’s a good person, straightforward, and he expects for us to be the same way.”
Rockey Felker, who heads recruitment for the team and trains running backs, said Croom has his priorities in all the right places.
“It’s refreshing that in the day of big-time athletics, you’ve got a head coach that realizes what the priorities are in life. We are very fortunate to have someone like him in terms of how he deals with players,” Felker said.
Croom said the values of discipline, hard work and the desire to win by operating ethically are implanted in his team’s mindset.
“They believe in what we’re doing,” Croom said. “They understand better the responsibilities that they carry when they go onto the field and represent this university, our fans and our state. I think that bodes well for the years ahead.”
Those priorities offer hope to a program that Croom has built from the ground up during his three years at MSU. He said the football program is steadily moving forward.
“We keep pushing on,” Croom said. “Every day we get up and be the best we can be today. Yesterday is gone. What anybody says makes no difference … good things will happen. The impossible will become a reality, and if you don’t approach it, the worst thing that can happen is for the opportunity for you to achieve greatness comes and you are not prepared. That is what I was taught, and that’s what we teach our football team now.”
“Prepare to seize the opportunity for greatness when it comes,” Croom said, “because it’s going to come.