MSU practices three times during its open week before fall break.
Football Refocuses During Open Week
October 03, 2017 | Football
STARKVILLE, Miss. – After a stretch that included three straight games against Top-15 opponents, head coach Dan Mullen and Mississippi State football are spending open week focusing on fundamentals and refreshing health wise.
Mullen met with members of the media following Tuesday evening's practice, marking the second of three workouts for the Bulldogs this open week. MSU will go again Wednesday before four straight off days for fall break.
State (3-2, 1-2 SEC) begins preparations for BYU (1-4) on Monday. The Bulldogs and Cougars kick off at 11 a.m. CT on Saturday, Oct. 14 in Davis Wade Stadium. It opens a stretch of four home games in five weeks. BYU hosts Boise State on Friday night and then makes its first trek to Starkville for the first time since 2001.
Below are quotes from Mullen's media session:
HEAD COACH DAN MULLEN
Opening statement…
"We'll practice today, and we'll practice tomorrow. And then for the first time in nine years – I don't know if we matched up with the school or the school matched up their schedule with us – but it's fall break for our guys, which I think is a huge deal. The biggest thing right now is quality of life for the student-athletes. We found a way to get decent quality of life for the student-athletes right now that their bye week matches up with fall break, so that our players get some opportunity to go home and see their families. We're giving them Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday off. I'm going to try and spend some family time, a little bit. It's always tough this time of year for coaches. I try as much as I can to make sure coaches get decent quality of life and go see their family. I'm excited to see my wife and my kids a little bit and get back to my caddying."
On how the team has reacted throughout the last few practices…
"This week you're working a lot of different little things, the fundamentals. Everybody's kind of on different levels. What you're trying to do is get some of the guys that have played a whole lot a little bit rested by working technique, fundamentals and some things that they need to improve on. As a team, we're cleaning up some things that we want to do better. You get to some really base offense and defense for some of the guys that maybe aren't playing as a lot. You get to give them a lot of reps so that they're one step closer. You never know. We teach all our guys, like Greg Eiland, you better be ready at that moment when your number gets called. We're giving a lot of those guys reps so they're a little bit closer to being ready to play."
On freshman offensive lineman Greg Eiland…
"He went in there and did okay. He's got a ways to go, but he's a freshman. He did some decent things and other times looked like a freshman out there. He's getting a bunch of reps this week just in case he's got to go again."
On the team's injury update…
"We've got guys banged up and won't know much until next week. We kind of give a lot of those guys the week off. Then we'll talk to [athletic trainer] Dan [Jacobi]. He'll come up and give the update, and I say never mind on the update because we're letting everybody rest. He'll let me know Monday where we're at."
On junior quarterback Nick Fitzgerald's performance against Auburn …
"It's got to get better. He's got to get better. We talk a lot, and this is a great week to get to go work. We're working on a lot of technique this week."
On sophomore receiver Jamal Couch's contributions against Auburn…
"We'd love to use him more. That's what these weeks are for. We're looking at young guys. He got thrown into some action last year as a true freshman, and then Reggie [Todd] is a redshirt freshman. They're really coming along. This is a great week for them to accelerate. They're getting a majority of the reps, Jamal and Reggie, and we're kind of force feeding to get them up to speed and get them ready to go."
On junior Malik Dear's injury update…
"It'll be a Monday thing. Monday we should have a feel of where we're at. Today we rested him, and yesterday he had 30-something reps in practice. But we'll see how it goes. He looks good. He loves football. It's good to see him running around and having some fun, getting the opportunity to practice. He's not 100 percent, so that's what the whole decision is – is he good enough to go right now with his health?
On getting a head start on preparations for BYU…
"Coaching-wise, yes. But we're giving everybody the extended weekend. Subconsciously, we've got some things in there for the guys, but we haven't done it as game plan for our guys. There's some things we've split up. Instead of good-on-good, we're really trying to get the young guys accelerated. We'll do some scout work and some advance work, but they don't know that they're getting it."
On balancing an equilibrium between wins and losses…
"They're learning. They're young guys; everything's kind of new for a lot of these guys here. Having done this now for a while now as a head coach, I've come to learn the team's lifespan is very short. I've been here a long time, and I'll say, 'Oh, remember this?' And they're like, 'Coach, I was in seventh grade when he was playing.' So I'm like, 'Okay, so you don't remember that situation.' If you go back to all the excitement and hype around the program a couple years ago, Tolando Cleveland is the only guy who really played in any game. Gabe [Myles] and Dez Harris were redshirting when we had that big run – even if you think, oh, that's not that long ago. But I think that when you look at how fast college careers are, everything for a lot of the guys is new. Winning and getting attention was new. Getting knocked down was new. Going and not doing the things you need to do at all was new. They were very different games. But they learned that experience. How do we respond to that with a bye week? Okay, well now we're in the bye week; how do we transition back to winning? One of the next four is against an SEC West team, if you look at it that way – even though Kentucky's kind of a little bit of a rivalry game to me because we play them every year and there's a lot of familiarity. So they're learning. Some of it's good; some of it's bad. It is what it is. I try to see what they're doing and guide the ship in the right direction, emotionally."
Mullen met with members of the media following Tuesday evening's practice, marking the second of three workouts for the Bulldogs this open week. MSU will go again Wednesday before four straight off days for fall break.
State (3-2, 1-2 SEC) begins preparations for BYU (1-4) on Monday. The Bulldogs and Cougars kick off at 11 a.m. CT on Saturday, Oct. 14 in Davis Wade Stadium. It opens a stretch of four home games in five weeks. BYU hosts Boise State on Friday night and then makes its first trek to Starkville for the first time since 2001.
Below are quotes from Mullen's media session:
HEAD COACH DAN MULLEN
Opening statement…
"We'll practice today, and we'll practice tomorrow. And then for the first time in nine years – I don't know if we matched up with the school or the school matched up their schedule with us – but it's fall break for our guys, which I think is a huge deal. The biggest thing right now is quality of life for the student-athletes. We found a way to get decent quality of life for the student-athletes right now that their bye week matches up with fall break, so that our players get some opportunity to go home and see their families. We're giving them Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday off. I'm going to try and spend some family time, a little bit. It's always tough this time of year for coaches. I try as much as I can to make sure coaches get decent quality of life and go see their family. I'm excited to see my wife and my kids a little bit and get back to my caddying."
On how the team has reacted throughout the last few practices…
"This week you're working a lot of different little things, the fundamentals. Everybody's kind of on different levels. What you're trying to do is get some of the guys that have played a whole lot a little bit rested by working technique, fundamentals and some things that they need to improve on. As a team, we're cleaning up some things that we want to do better. You get to some really base offense and defense for some of the guys that maybe aren't playing as a lot. You get to give them a lot of reps so that they're one step closer. You never know. We teach all our guys, like Greg Eiland, you better be ready at that moment when your number gets called. We're giving a lot of those guys reps so they're a little bit closer to being ready to play."
On freshman offensive lineman Greg Eiland…
"He went in there and did okay. He's got a ways to go, but he's a freshman. He did some decent things and other times looked like a freshman out there. He's getting a bunch of reps this week just in case he's got to go again."
On the team's injury update…
"We've got guys banged up and won't know much until next week. We kind of give a lot of those guys the week off. Then we'll talk to [athletic trainer] Dan [Jacobi]. He'll come up and give the update, and I say never mind on the update because we're letting everybody rest. He'll let me know Monday where we're at."
On junior quarterback Nick Fitzgerald's performance against Auburn …
"It's got to get better. He's got to get better. We talk a lot, and this is a great week to get to go work. We're working on a lot of technique this week."
On sophomore receiver Jamal Couch's contributions against Auburn…
"We'd love to use him more. That's what these weeks are for. We're looking at young guys. He got thrown into some action last year as a true freshman, and then Reggie [Todd] is a redshirt freshman. They're really coming along. This is a great week for them to accelerate. They're getting a majority of the reps, Jamal and Reggie, and we're kind of force feeding to get them up to speed and get them ready to go."
On junior Malik Dear's injury update…
"It'll be a Monday thing. Monday we should have a feel of where we're at. Today we rested him, and yesterday he had 30-something reps in practice. But we'll see how it goes. He looks good. He loves football. It's good to see him running around and having some fun, getting the opportunity to practice. He's not 100 percent, so that's what the whole decision is – is he good enough to go right now with his health?
On getting a head start on preparations for BYU…
"Coaching-wise, yes. But we're giving everybody the extended weekend. Subconsciously, we've got some things in there for the guys, but we haven't done it as game plan for our guys. There's some things we've split up. Instead of good-on-good, we're really trying to get the young guys accelerated. We'll do some scout work and some advance work, but they don't know that they're getting it."
On balancing an equilibrium between wins and losses…
"They're learning. They're young guys; everything's kind of new for a lot of these guys here. Having done this now for a while now as a head coach, I've come to learn the team's lifespan is very short. I've been here a long time, and I'll say, 'Oh, remember this?' And they're like, 'Coach, I was in seventh grade when he was playing.' So I'm like, 'Okay, so you don't remember that situation.' If you go back to all the excitement and hype around the program a couple years ago, Tolando Cleveland is the only guy who really played in any game. Gabe [Myles] and Dez Harris were redshirting when we had that big run – even if you think, oh, that's not that long ago. But I think that when you look at how fast college careers are, everything for a lot of the guys is new. Winning and getting attention was new. Getting knocked down was new. Going and not doing the things you need to do at all was new. They were very different games. But they learned that experience. How do we respond to that with a bye week? Okay, well now we're in the bye week; how do we transition back to winning? One of the next four is against an SEC West team, if you look at it that way – even though Kentucky's kind of a little bit of a rivalry game to me because we play them every year and there's a lot of familiarity. So they're learning. Some of it's good; some of it's bad. It is what it is. I try to see what they're doing and guide the ship in the right direction, emotionally."
Players Mentioned
DB
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WR
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OL
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QB
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