Jeff Lebby and Mississippi State are taking another deep dive into the transfer portal to reconstruct the Bulldogs after a 2-10 season, the program’s worst since 2003.
MSU saw 25 players enter the transfer portal in December and has brought in 16 players to replace their production. Notably, the offense is undergoing a serious makeover in the trenches and at running back and quarterback. However, the most alarming and perhaps costly aspect of Lebby’s debut season was the lack of a consistent defense.
The Bulldogs’ defense ranked 118th out of 134 teams in FBS in 2024, down from 68th in 2023 and 40th in 2022. This is a steady and steep decline for what was once Mississippi State’s most consistent unit, one that produced 30 of the 45 MSU players drafted to the NFL since 2010.
At their height, the Bulldogs were the second-best defense in the country in 2018. It may have been an outlier even in an impressive decade at Davis-Wade Stadium, but it was still a reflection of the consistency in recruiting and production on that side of the ball. There was an identity, especially on the defensive line, and now there is none.
At least, not yet.
The Bulldogs have a long way to go, and part of that includes building an identity on both sides of the ball that can sustain them against a rigorous schedule. The Southeastern Conference is unforgiving, even in its down years, and Lebby has no choice but to build a defense again with only a handful of key pieces already in-house. Linebacker Stone Blanton returns as well as Conerly Trophy nominee Issac Smith at safety. They are good players to build around, but they aren’t enough to change a team’s fortunes and that is the situation the Bulldogs are in to rebuild on that side of the ball. Recruits and portal additions both need to come good.
— Colin Damms
Coaching changes were necessary, even if the timing is odd
It appeared that MSU would stick with Lebby’s full coaching staff from the 2024 season after no moves were made in the immediate aftermath of the Egg Bowl.
This week, though, Lebby brought on Phil Loadholt to replace Cody Kennedy as the Bulldogs’ offensive line coach. Loadholt worked as an analyst under Lebby at UCF, Ole Miss and Oklahoma before spending this fall coaching the offensive line at Colorado, and he had a seven-year career in the NFL with the Minnesota Vikings.
Kennedy had SEC experience before coming to MSU — he worked at Arkansas for three years — but Loadholt knows what it takes to play at the highest level, and he helped Colorado land a few highly sought-after recruits on the offensive line.
Also coming over from Colorado is Vincent Dancy, a Mississippi native who will coach the Bulldogs’ defensive ends and outside linebackers. That leaves MSU with 11 position coaches, one more than teams are allowed to have on the field during games or out recruiting. Dancy’s addition could mean a diminished role for defensive line coach David Turner or that the two will simply share duties with that position group.
Lebby also added defensive analyst Paul Rhoads, who has been in coaching for more than three decades including 18 as a college head coach or defensive coordinator. Rhoads may not have an on-field role in games, but his experience will help him oversee the entire defense as the Bulldogs try to build that unit back toward what it looked like in its heyday.
— Benjamin Rosenberg
Taking care of the ball
Head coach Sam Purcell’s Bulldogs are averaging 16.4 turnovers per game and have had 15 or more turnovers in ten games this season, notably in each of their last seven games. They still managed to go 6-1 over the last seven games with the only loss coming by one possession on the road at Georgia Tech, an opponent boasting a 12-0 record and currently ranked 13th in the AP Top 25.
That being said, the schedule is about to pick up drastically. After the trip to face No. 16 Kentucky, the Bulldogs face reigning national champions South Carolina on Sunday and No. 9 Oklahoma next Thursday. It’s the start of a daunting SEC schedule which includes eight opponents in the Top 25.
Four of the top 25 teams in forcing turnovers are SEC teams, with Tennessee leading all of Division I with an average of 27.58 forced turnovers per game through 12 games.
The team’s leaders in turnovers by far are newcomers, led by Eniya Russell, 46, Madina Okot and Denim DeShields, 39 each. Some of that can certainly be attributed to building chemistry and trying to discover the best roles in a new setup early on. That’s why the Bulldogs play these nonconference games after all, but the SEC is another story.
Sam Purcell’s third season is off to a good start, with MSU achieving its best start to a season since 2018-19, when the Bulldogs reached the Elite Eight. However, the turnovers are a worrying trend for the Bulldogs, something that simply cannot continue, and now is the time to see just how glaring a weakness they are against some of the best teams in the country.
— Colin Damms
MSU missing Jans’ signature defensive identity
As the Bulldogs prepare for their SEC opener Saturday against South Carolina, head coach Chris Jans knew his team’s defense wasn’t going to be the juggernaut it was the last two years. But through 13 non-conference games, MSU is 14th in the conference in scoring defense, 15th in opponents’ field goal percentage and dead last in opponents’ 3-point percentage.
The Bulldogs’ worst showings on that end of the floor came in their lone loss to Butler and too-close wins over Prairie View A&M and Bethune-Cookman. MSU still has veteran Cameron Matthews to anchor the defense, but his longtime partner in crime, D.J. Jeffries, is gone, and without him the Bulldogs have struggled to guard the ball and stop ball-handlers at the point of attack.
The good news for MSU is that it has played well defensively in its biggest games. The Bulldogs held Pittsburgh to 31% shooting in a blowout win, and limited Memphis — one of the best 3-point shooting teams in the country — to a 4-for-20 start from distance in another impressive victory. And in SEC play, nearly every team MSU faces will be comparable to the Panthers and Tigers.
The Bulldogs are much improved offensively with a deeper backcourt, meaning Josh Hubbard does not have to take over every night. But there will be games when MSU is not hitting shots and the defense will have to carry the day, and when that happens, Jans and company will need to win ugly as they did so many times in 2023 and 2024.
— Benjamin Rosenberg
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