Mississippi State football: Grading the Bulldogs after loss to LSU

Sep 16, 2023; Starkville, Mississippi, USA; LSU Tigers quarterback Jayden Daniels (5) runs the ball for a touchdown while defended by Mississippi State Bulldogs safety Isaac Smith (20) during the third quarter at Davis Wade Stadium at Scott Field. Mandatory Credit: Matt Bush-USA TODAY Sports
Sep 16, 2023; Starkville, Mississippi, USA; LSU Tigers quarterback Jayden Daniels (5) runs the ball for a touchdown while defended by Mississippi State Bulldogs safety Isaac Smith (20) during the third quarter at Davis Wade Stadium at Scott Field. Mandatory Credit: Matt Bush-USA TODAY Sports
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Mississippi State football fell hard against the LSU Tigers. Let’s examine the MSU Bulldogs after that horrifying loss to the Tigers.

That’s certainly not what anyone wanted to see out of Zach Arnett and the Mississippi State football team.

Saturday afternoon featured a disastrous, embarrassing loss at home in Davis Wade Stadium as the Bulldogs faced off against the LSU Tigers in front of over 60,000 fans (though there’s no way there were that many people in the building once the second half rolled around).

The game wasn’t even close and Mississippi State clearly struggled from the get go as MSU gave up 17 points in the first quarter alone. The whole game was a bit of a disaster and Miss. State ended up dropping this one 41-14 (in a game that could have been a lot more lopsided than it actually was).

So, what can we take away from this? Is there anything we can learn?

Well, we learned that LSU’s Jayden Daniels is efficient and effective and MSU sure couldn’t slow him down, let alone stop him.

We also learned that Kevin Barbay and the MSU offense is still a massive work in progress, despite the fact that Mississippi State fans were expecting him to focus a considerable amount of effort into tailoring the offense to his personnel all throughout the offseason.

And MSU lost. Big time.

So, let’s evaluate the Bulldogs after that with totally scientific grading system that largely involves examining how much my heart hurt.

Time to go over how the Bulldogs performed and provide some grades for them.