Some matchups tell you what a team wants to do — others tell you what a team cannot afford to let happen.
For Kane Wommack and Alabama's defense, Mississippi State presents a little bit of both.
This multidimensional approach has stood out on film through the Bulldogs' first four games, with rising star quarterback Kamario Taylor and offensive-minded head coach Jeff Lebby finding ways to stress opposing defenses by consistently putting their speedy playmakers in position to make something happen.
The numbers back it up.
Four different Mississippi State wide receivers are averaging more than 14 yards per catch so far this season: Anthony Evans III (5-foot-11, 190 pounds) at 14.6 ypc, Sanfrisco Magee (6-foot-2, 200 pounds) at 16.0, Marquis Johnson (5-foot-11, 190 pounds) at 17.8, and Zion Ragins (5-foot-8, 170 pounds) at 17.3.
Together, they've given Taylor 32 receptions for 521 yards and 7 touchdowns so far. That's a significant chunk of an offense that leads the entire SEC and ranks fourth nationally, averaging 533.3 yards and 43 points per game coming in.
That kind of mass production was made obvious Monday during Kane Wommack's weekly press conference, when the third-year defensive coordinator pointed directly to the speed and tempo Mississippi State has throughout its offense — both intermediate and vertical.
Kane Wommack knows Mississippi State has the speed and tempo to stress Alabama out defensively
“They’ve got multiple guys that have documented 10.2, 10.3 speeds, whether it was coming out of high school or whatever,” Wommack said. “Obviously, with GPS and all of those things you can get, they’re putting up some very high numbers.”
For Alabama, that speed carries a little more weight for a defense that is strong on its backend but has seen more explosive plays than its liking, allowing 22 completions of at least 15 yards and 10 of at least 25 yards through its first month of the season. No, those numbers don't tell the entire story, but they do explain why Wommack is giving so much attention to a Mississippi State offense that can turn small mistakes into big plays with its speed and tempo.
And that's no accident. Lebby has made speed a foundational part of how he wants his Bulldog offense to play.
“If you didn’t know it, we do like speed, and we have for a long time, and that’s not ever going to change,” Lebby told David Pollack on his See Ball Get Ball podcast. “You can’t tackle what you can’t touch, and that’s reality. We need fast guys and are proud of this group. We need those guys to go play their butt off on Saturday and play the game that we play.”
For Alabama's secondary, slowing that down could be one of the most important parts of handling Saturday's road test in Starkville.
The cowbells will be ringing. Lebby and Mississippi State will be confident.
It'll be interesting to see if Alabama can play fast enough defensively to keep up without playing so fast that it loses the discipline needed to keep the Bulldogs' speed from becoming a problem.
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