Don’t Give Up On The Dawgs
November 14, 2021 | Football, Joel Coleman
Once again, the Bulldogs pull off a comeback for the ages.
STARKVILLE – Alright, be honest. Go ahead and raise your hand if you'd started to give up on Mississippi State on Saturday.
Don't be shy to admit it. When the Bulldogs were trailing Auburn 28-3 in the second quarter, at least a little doubt crept in didn't it? Even the sunniest of sunshine pumpers surely had a cloud or two roll in.
No one could've been blamed for not liking the chances of overcoming a 25-point deficit on the home field of the nation's 16th-ranked team. After all, it's a mountain the Bulldogs hadn't climbed before at any point in their 122 seasons of playing football.
Fortunately for State, none of that mattered to the boys playing in Maroon and White on The Plains. Giving up? Ha. That's nowhere – absolutely nowhere – in this team's DNA.
"We're never out of the fight with anything we do," quarterback Will Rogers said. "We play hard and we play 'til the fourth quarter."
"We never had a doubt that we were going to win the game," linebacker Aaron Brule added.
The 2021 Bulldogs aren't a group that packs it in. They just don't.
Remember the season opener? Down 20 in the fourth quarter to Louisiana Tech, MSU rallied for what was then the biggest comeback in school history before topping that mark on Saturday. State nearly erased double-digit deficits at Memphis and against LSU. At Arkansas, the Bulldogs came back from behind to take leads on a couple of different occasions when down by two scores.
As baseball legend Babe Ruth once said, you just can't beat the person who never gives up. And these Dawgs, well they keep biting, no matter the odds.
Saturday's win over Auburn wasn't just an incredible feat of athleticism. It was a testament to an insatiable will to win that head coach Mike Leach has instilled in his program.
State wasn't just down 25 points in the second quarter. The Bulldogs couldn't get anything going at all offensively in the early going, save for a Nolan McCord 34-yard field goal.
Meanwhile Auburn scored touchdowns on each of its first four drives. Things looked to be spiraling for State. But…
"The biggest thing was, we didn't get discouraged by the first half, and that would've been easy to do," Leach said.
When this game gets talked about in the future, many will start with State's incredible second half performance. Let no one forget though, the Bulldogs' rise actually began sooner.
A 10-play, 75-yard drive just before halftime shrank MSU's hole to 28-10. It was a figurative faint hoofbeat in the distance, signifying a stampede was coming.
Rogers later called it the biggest drive of the game. It put State within striking distance and the Bulldogs knew after the half, they'd get the ball. Rogers' command after the intermission?
"We're going to score and we're going to get a stop," Rogers said.
That's precisely what happened. Then it kept happening over and over again.
All told during the comeback, State put together its longest drive of the season (98 yards). The Bulldogs scored touchdowns on six consecutive series, save for their brief 12-second possession prior to the clock running out in the first half.
There were 40 unanswered points with each touchdown scored courtesy of the arm of Rogers. He broke the school record with his six touchdown passes, despite not throwing a single one until the back half of the second quarter.
"He needs to start throwing as well in the first half as he does the second half," Leach quipped.
Makai Polk and Jamire Calvin each had two touchdown receptions. Malik Heath and Dillon Johnson had one each.
Polk of course had MSU's first touchdown catch of the day that ignited the Bulldog charge. At the time, he'd shushed the Auburn crowd and the Tiger faithful only cheered louder. When Polk crossed the goal line again later, it put the Bulldogs in front 29-28. He again put his finger to his lips, and this time, the crowd seemingly obliged. Rogers, Polk and MSU had stunned the Tigers into silence.
"I felt like that was one of the daggers of the game," Polk said. "It felt really good."
For all the offensive highlights, how about the Bulldog defense's second-half resurgence? In the final two quarters, the Tigers mustered only 158 yards against MSU. State allowed minus 14 rushing yards. Auburn had six second-half drives and only one of them ended in points.
"Going into the second half (defensive coordinator Zach Arnett) just dialed it up and we just dialed it up with him," Brule said.
When the clock ran out, it was finally cemented. The biggest comeback in school history was complete.
The heroes were many. There was Rogers, who along with his six passing scores, completed 80 percent of his passes for 415 yards.
"Will's a dog," Johnson said. "We believe in him and everything runs through him…We go as far as Will takes us."
"It's just a blessing," Rogers said himself. "I can't put it into words. I'm living the dream just being able to be the quarterback for this university. It's just a blessing and I'm thankful for it every single day."
Rogers, meanwhile, tipped his own hat to his pass catchers.
"I've got to give a lot of credit to my receivers," Rogers said. "All of our receivers that played, I thought they played really well today, and they did a great job."
Of course there was also an offensive line to pave the way for State's offensive resurgence, as well as Arnett's defensive group as a whole turning up the temperature.
To put together a comeback like this, it takes a total group effort. But above all else, it takes grit. It takes determination. It takes heart. These Bulldogs have all of that and then some.
It's been said in the past, but it might apply to this group as much as any. Don't give up on the Dawgs. Because there's certainly no ounce of give in them.
"When you're down 28-3, a lot of teams quit," Johnson said.
A lot of teams, but not Mississippi State.
