Mississippi State's Sam Purcell wants to bring Bulldogs back to 'glory years'

It wasn’t too long ago that Mississippi State was one of the powers of women’s college basketball, securing No. 1 seeds in the NCAA Tournament and making it to Final Fours. In 2017 and 2018, the Bulldogs made the national championship game in back-to-back tournaments under then-head coach Vic Schaefer.

Current head coach Sam Purcell knows that level of success is possible at Mississippi State, where he’s currently in his second season as the head women’s basketball coach. With a massive win over LSU on Monday night to send Mississippi State to 17-5 after making the NCAA Tournament in Year 1, things are looking up for Purcell and Co. in Starkville.

“I’ll never forget — I was in my living room and it was South Carolina playing Mississippi State and obviously I was an assistant at Louisville and I was just in awe,” Purcell said on the “Paul Finebaum Show” on Tuesday, recalling the 2017 national championship game. “I was like, ‘Wow, look at that energy in that building. Look what Vic Schaefer and them were doing on a national stage.’ Just a bunch of underdogs that were changing the narrative out there and just another program that was competing to be in that top space.”

Things got sideways after Schaefer left the program following the 2019-20 season to become Texas‘ head coach. Across two seasons — including a Covid-altered 2020-21 campaign — the Bulldogs went 25-23.

Ahead of the 2022-23 season, the Bulldogs tabbed Purcell from the Louisville staff to take over. In Year 1, he guided his squad to the NCAA Tournament play-in as an 11 seed. After winning that play-in game, Mississippi State pulled off an upset before falling in the Round of 32.

It’s a strong building block for Purcell and Mississippi State to try and exceed in Year 2.

“So when this job came open, it was a gold mine job,” Purcell said. “And I told people from Day 1, I want to get that program back to those glory years that you all experienced and I’m going to try to do it as fast as I can and I’m really, to your point, where we’re at in Year 2, for us to go to the NCAA Tournament in Year 1 and make history, now in Year 2, we’re trying to repeat it. But I’ve got a tough schedule ahead of me here in the SEC because we’re headed to Kentucky here soon and they make me really nervous, coming up.”