Mississippi State Sports Blog

Opening Comments…
“We’re getting ready to go back out there with practice this afternoon. With it being fall break for school we gave our players the day off yesterday. I’m not much of a weatherman, but as I was walking to team chapel yesterday I noticed it was probably a good idea, because I don’t think it ever stopped raining yesterday. We haven’t met with our guys yet to review the film from the last game, we plan to do that today. Hopefully, with school being out for the next two days, we’ll get a little jump start on prepping for Houston. We’ll have our hands full this week, with one of the top offensive teams in the country coming to town. This will be a unique challenge for us, and Houston is coming off a tough loss last week, but the week before everyone was saying they should be a top 10 team. I know in their minds, they still think they should be and you watch them on film they still have the same potential they’ve possessed all season.”

On injuries…
“We’ve got some guys dinged up but we’ll see how practice goes today. We’ve always got a couple guys that wont practice after a game, but we’ll have a better idea on Wednesday on where we stand injury-wise. We’re only in helmets today, with review and a brief introduction to our preparation for Houston. Our younger guys who don’t play much will hang around and play a little Monday night football with the pads on.”

On Chad Bumphis…
“Chad (Bumphis) had some good one-on-one situations which allowed him to make plays. You saw on Saturday the things he does well, but he still has a lot of things he can improve on and get better at too. He made some big plays and was much better fundamentally, such as route running. Mistakes he was making the prior week he eliminated and improved on them this week, and that is what led him to being open. When these guys get the opportunity to study the tape they’re going to get to see how they improve week-to-week and that is important for them in seeing their results.”

On Houston’s defense…
“Their defense plays a lot of snaps every game, because their offense scores so quickly, the defense has to play majority of the game. It is a simple math problem, the more plays you play in a game, the more yards you are going to give up. I think it is deceiving when you look at that stat, because of how many plays their defense plays a game.”

On the option…
“I like option football. I think it makes the defense have to defend all 11 players on the field, and I think that is an important component of any offense. One of the things that makes the running game a little quicker is an experienced offensive line and three senior tailbacks, who’re able to adjust quickly because of their experience.”

On the fullback…
“We play a lot of different guys. (Christian) Ducre, (Arnil) Stallworth, (Patrick) Hanrahan, (Sylvester) Hemphill all have played fullback for us this season. We like rolling those guys through and it is partly trying to fit your personnel that is out there. (Anthony) Dixon has even played some fullback for us this season. The versatility they all have has helped us and I am happy with the young guys we have, who’re probably more traditional fullbacks, they help us do what we want to do with our multiple back sets.”

On Houston’s quarterback Case Keenum…
“He’s like all the great quarterbacks, in that he is a winner. You watch him on film and when the game’s on-the-line he makes the plays to win. He’s a very accurate passer and good at reading defenses. That’s exactly what you want in quarterbacks.”

On defensive back Maurice Langston…
“He’s coming along, obviously with his late start he’s way behind in our schemes and in conditioning, but he is improving each day.”

On freshman practice tonight…
“It is great because they came here to play some football. A lot of times they’re doing scout team work and this gives them the opportunity to run our offenses and defenses and gives them an opportunity to play the game. They enjoy it as a mental relief from some other things they’ve got to do. It also helps them keep their understanding of what is going on in offense and defense.”

On possible redshirts…
“We’re getting close to deciding, but it’s still a long season. We have seven games ahead of us, and the injuries we might face could play an effect on that.”

On the quarterback position…
“We’ve got to get Chris (Relf) in a good rhythm through the course of the game. Last game, he went in there and fumbled the football as soon as we put him in there. Then we put him back in there and he did a nice job running the ball, but at that point, we were behind and needed to throw the football and make some plays and Tyson (Lee) was already in the rhythm of the game. Even though we are putting up some numbers and we are executing on offense, we are not getting into a good rhythm early in the game, which forces us to play catch up the rest of the football game and we’re not able to rotate the quarterbacks the way we would like to.”

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