Some time in the second half of Mississippi State's win over Auburn on Saturday, Mike Leach decided he'd had enough of his wide receivers. Or at least his wide receivers' actions when the offense wasn't on the field.
“We were in that period of time where it sure seemed to me we were a lot more interested in sitting in that chair than being on the football field or rooting for our teammates, so it was my opinion that we oughta be rooting for our teammates rather than kind of lounge it because we pretty much had everything but playing cards over there, so I thought it was time to move on from that," Leach said.
And so he removed the option of sitting from them.
Coach Leach had a discussion with his receivers, and shortly after he took all of the chairs up. pic.twitter.com/8J6EVkDubz
— Jonathan Flippo⚜️ (@JonathanFlippo) November 6, 2022
After building a 24-3 first half lead, Mississippi State had to piece together a 6-play, 24-yard drive in 27 seconds to set up Massimo Biscardi's 44-yard field goal to tie the game with 29 seconds to play. Improbably, the Bulldogs had an opportunity to kick another field to win the game in regulation, which was short.
The Bulldogs won the game, 39-33 in overtime.
"I’ll get in trouble for this, I’m certain—but where instead of playing hard and getting a first down and getting a play, you wanna sit behind a shade tree, eat a fish sandwich and drink a lemonade with your fat little girlfriend, and that’s what we’re shooting for way too often," Leach said. When can we relax, making judgments on plays. It definitely bit us pretty hard and created some obstacles we had to fight through.”
Human nature will likely not be an issue this week. Mississippi State hosts No. 1 Georgia on Saturday night (7 p.m. ET, ESPN).