STARKVILLE — Over a wild, remarkable four-week stretch earlier this season, Mississippi State’s football team earned its first No. 1 ranking.
Now the Bulldogs will defend their place in The Associated Press Top 25 and Amway Coaches Poll (USA Today).
That’s what No. 1 MSU (6-0, 3-0 Southeastern Conference) will do at 2:30 p.m. Saturday (WCBI) when it plays at Kentucky (5-2, 2-2).
“This is the biggest game we have played this season,” MSU coach Dan Mullen said. “I said the Auburn game was the biggest game ever played in the state of Mississippi. This game is bigger. Now we are a team that has a target on our back. We have to go on the road in a hostile environment and play one of the hottest and most improved teams in college football. Our guys better learn how to handle that and realize how big of a game this really is.”
That target is new to the Bulldogs, but it is deserved after victories against then-No. 8 LSU, then-No. 6 Texas A&M, and then-No. 2 Auburn. This week, its second atop the polls, MSU received 43 of a 60 first-place votes in The AP Top 25.
Kentucky is on the brink of bowl eligibility in its second season under coach Mark Stoops. LSU beat Kentucky 41-3 last week in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
“They are 5-2, with both losses coming on the road in the SEC,” Mullen said. “One was a double-overtime game (at Florida). When you look at the improvement they have made, they can compete with anyone.”
Kentucky, winless in conference play a season ago, played MSU well in Starkville in Stoops’ first season, suffering a 28-22 loss. But MSU, under Mullen, has won five straight and seven of the last eight games in the series.
“They’re a very talented football team,” Stoops said of MSU. “You could tell they had a lot of confidence coming into the season by the way they carried themselves at SEC Media (Days), just listening to them with their quarterback and leadership. Dan is in sixth year in the process, and they have a good-looking team.”
n In related news, MSU President Mark Keenum has been named to a committee that will search for a new commissioner of the SEC.
Commissioner Mike Slive announced last week he will retire from the post next July, after 13 years in that position.
Others on the search committee are Arkansas Chancellor David Gearhart, Alabama President Judith Bonner, kentucky President Eli Capilouto, and Missouri Chancellor R. Bowen Loftin.
Follow Dispatch sports writer Brandon Walker on Twitter @BWonStateBeat
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