You Gotta Have More Cowbell! Mississippi State knocks-off Arizona State in a thriller

Do you believe in miracles? After tonight, Mississippi State fans certainly do.

After watching their Bulldogs blow a 17-0 lead at home against No. 12 Arizona State, it seemed even more misery was in store for the Maroon and White faithful. But QB Blake Shapen and WR Brenen Thomspson had other plans.

With 41 seconds to go, down 20-17 with the ball on their own 42-yard line, Shapen delivered a strike to Thompson streaking up the seam. The speedster outraced the trailing ASU DB to the endzone to put the Bulldogs ahead and send a packed-out Davis Wade Stadium into pandemonium.

The Bulldog defense would record a game-sealing interception on the ensuing ASU drive, and Mississippi State earned its biggest win in years by a final score of 24-20. Fans stormed the field and ripped down the Davis Wade Stadium goalposts.

After a long stretch of ugly fall Saturdays in Starkville, cowbells could finally be rung in jubilee once again.

Blake Shapen delivered when he the Bulldogs needed him most

Box scores can sometimes be deceiving. If you looked at Blake Shapen's final line of 19/33 for 279 yards with three TDs and no INTs, you'd think he played outstanding throughout this matchup. In reality, he had some rough moments.

Outside of a few nice throws in the first half, Shapen never looked fully comfortable. He had some tough misses, took some ugly sacks, and made some decisions that likely kept points off the board for the Bulldogs.

But when the game was on the line, he delivered. Shapen went 3/4 on the final drive, the lone incompletion being a drop. He stood in and made a perfect strike to Brenen Thompson despite missing him earlier in the half. Do the Bulldogs need more consistency from their QB? Absolutely. But he deserves credit for stepping up in the moment.

Despite a rough second half, the Mississippi State defense delivered in a big way

Give Coleman Hutzler his props. His defense is a whole lot better than it was last year. Yes, the second half was rough. The Bulldogs got run all over after the break. It didn't matter how many defensive linemen they had on the field. It didn't matter how many players they put in the box. Arizona State was bullying them on the ground, and it was almost too much to handle.

But here is why Hutzler deserves kudos: if not for his defense, Mississippi State doesn't win this game. They are the ones that completely shut down the Sun Devils in the first half while the Bulldog offense wasn't sustaining drives. They are the ones that made the critical stop on the goal line in the final minutes to give the offense a chance. And they stepped up and forced the game-sealing pick at the end.

There's still a lot that has to get better for the Bulldog defense going forward, but fans should be pleased at how things are trending.

Jeff Lebby and Mississippi State finally have momentum

This was an insane game. There were plenty of positives to take away, but there were quite a few negatives too. It might be hard to extrapolate too much from this game with regards to how the team will play the rest of the season merely because of how bizzare it was.

But if one thing is true, it's that Jeff Lebby's program finally has momentum. Mississippi State has so, so desperately needed to have something big happen for its football program. They needed to have something to point to that the locker room, fanbase, and even recruits could buy-in to as a rallying point.

Now they have it, and I cannot wait to see how they capitalize on that moving forward.