STARKVILLE — The Mississippi State football team can’t stop making history.
A day after beating No. 6 Texas A&M to knock off a second-straight top-10 team for the first time in school history, MSU reaped the rewards Sunday in the form of a No. 3 ranking in The Associated Press Top 25 Poll. It’s the highest ranking in program history and sets up a top-five matchup against No. 2 Auburn at 2:30 p.m. Saturday (WCBI) at Davis-Wade Stadium, also a program first.
It all started with a 48-31 dismantling of No. 6 Texas A&M in Starkville.
“We played one of the best teams in the country in Texas A&M, and we told our guys it was going to be a four-quarter battle, and it was,” MSU coach Dan Mullen said. “It was a great effort today by our guys.”
It also was an effort that is opening new doors. With the victory, Mullen improved to 5-0 for the second time in three years.
Unlike 2012, when MSU reached as high as No. 12 en route to its 7-0 start, national acclaim has been quick to follow on the heels of back-to-back wins against then-No. 8 LSU and then-No. 6 Texas A&M.
In addition to being ranked third in The AP Poll — tied with Ole Miss — MSU is No. 6 in the Amway/USA Today Coaches’ Poll. It has been a meteoric rise for the Bulldogs (5-0, 2-0 Southeastern Conference), who were unranked two weeks ago prior to their trip to Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
MSU’s move up the poll has been similar to that of a popular song on the Billboard Hot 100. When a song is attracting a lot of air play, it is said to have “a bullet” to mark its popularity.
For players like MSU quarterback Dak Prescott, beating Texas A&M was thrilling, but it also was expected.
“They are a very good football team, but we had confidence we could get the job done,” said Prescott, who stamped his name onto Heisman Trophy lists across the country with a 338-yard, five-touchdown performance. “That’s something that started in the offseason. We began to feel it come together then and we knew we had a chance to be a really good football team.”
So how did the Bulldogs jump nine spots in The AP Top 25? By drilling a team that entered the game 5-0 and was averaging 51.2 points per game. The Aggies, who led the SEC in total yards and points scored through five games, had a hard time competing against the Bulldogs’ strength up front. Offensively, MSU ran for 314 yards behind an offensive line that was missing senior center Dillon Day. Prescott rushed for 77 yards and three touchdowns. Defensively, MSU sacked quarterback Kenny Hill four times and intercepted him three times.
“Mississippi State came out and beat us,” Hill said. “They had a great game plan.”
That game plan resulted in 559 yards for the Bulldogs, marking the sixth-straight game MSU has topped the 500-yard mark, which is a school record. The three interceptions by Richie Brown also tied a school record.
“It was a whole team effort,” Brown said. “The ball kept finding me, and a lot of that is because the defensive line was getting pressure.”
As great as Brown was and as solidly as MSU’s defense played — Texas A&M had 17 points before scoring a pair of uncontested touchdowns in the final two minutes — the spotlight and the day belonged to Prescott, as it so often has in 2014. He threw touchdowns to sophomores De’Runnya Wilson and Fred Brown to give him five for the day, which raised his total to 20. The Haughton, Louisiana, native controlled the game and had touchdown runs of 3, 2, and 11 yards.
Asked if Prescott was handling the national media attention well following his start to the season, Mullen was blunt.
“He’s going to get a lot more attention after today’s performance,” Mullen said. “For us to keep winning, he has to play at a very high level. I think he has handled everything well.”
Count Texas A&M coach Kevin Sumlin, who was 3-1 against MSU before the loss, as a believer in Prescott, who has thrown 13 touchdowns and has only two interceptions this season.
“Dak Prescott was extremely efficient in his handling and how he played running the ball,” said Sumlin, whose team fell to No. 13 in the country after the setback. “They made some plays on the perimeter in tight coverage, and some of those back-shoulder throws Dak made were perfect.”
But Prescott wasn’t alone. Junior tailback Josh Robinson rushed for 107 yards, his fourth 100-yard outing of the season, and scored the Bulldogs’ first two touchdowns.
“That’s just Bulldog football,” said Robinson, the SEC’s third-leading rusher. “I knew my offensive line was going to come through, and it was going to be up to me and Dak to get the job done.”
Wilson led the way with four catches for 69 yards and a touchdown, pacing a group that was without leading pass catcher Jameon Lewis, who was scratched from the lineup minutes before the game due to a lower leg injury. It didn’t matter, as Prescott found six targets and was 15 of 21.
“That’s just guys stepping up,” Mullen said. “Our guys do a tremendous job of being ready when their number is called.”
The win sets the stage for anther SEC Western Division Showdown in Starkville. After dispatching then-No. 8 LSU and then-No. 6 Texas A&M in consecutive games, MSU will turn its attention to No. 2 Auburn.
“It’ll be our third top-10 game in a row, our third different offense in a row,” Mullen said. “We get the opportunity with the defending conference champions here next week. Dak and everybody have to be completely locked in, and we have to play our best game to get a win.”
Follow Dispatch sports writer Brandon Walker on Twitter @BWonStateBeat
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