Lebby pleased with defensive production as Bulldogs move through camp
A week of training camp is down for Jeff Lebby and Mississippi State and progress is being made daily.
For an offensive-minded coach like Lebby, he’d like for the offense to have had a smoother start to camp. As the head coach, seeing the defense have success and hold its own early has been promising.
“The last two days the defense dominated. (Wednesday) was a little more evenly matched, but defense has done a lot of good things – creating turnovers, having unbelievable energy and toughness and physicality,” Lebby said. “That back-and-forth is what we want to see. When things don’t go well, you want to see somebody respond. Coleman (Hutzler) and the defense have done a great job getting ready to practice every day.”
While the competition has created some spirited practices, Lebby is still pressuring his players to pick the offense up and be a well-oiled machine for game one against Eastern Kentucky.
For some coaches, installing the offense is something that is a work in progress and can take a few weeks to fully operate. Lebby has pushed the pedal down on his installations and wants his players to grasp it early so they can refine the next few weeks.
“We’re being incredibly aggressive with the install. We want to apply as much pressure as we can mentally and physically so we can see what guys we can count on,” Lebby said. “Our guys have taken to it. They’ve done a good job with it through the first 10 days of camp.”
The scheme is new for everyone on the roster. Some of the older dogs are in their third system at State while the rest of the players are coming from other schools as transfers or playing their first year of FBS football as junior college products or freshmen.
It’s helped Lebby that he had the spring with the bulk of his offensive pieces and now it’s been about retaining the information and putting it back into action. Like getting back on a bike, its been seamless for several of those players transitioning from spring and summer to training camp.
“Our guys got really good knowledge about what the expectations were, how we want to go play, how we do what we do,” Lebby said of the spring. “There’s still a ton of growth to be made at every position, but they have great intent, great energy in the building. We’re so far from perfect it ain’t funny, but our guys are wanting to get better. If we’ll continue that, we’ll be where we need to be.”
State has a mandatory off day on Thursday before getting back on the field for practices on Friday and Saturday. Sunday morning will feature the Bulldogs’ first scrimmage as Lebby will truly get a chance to see where his team stands two weeks into August.
The first-year coach is going to be taking things away from both sides of the ball as he assess just how far the team has come in the first several practices. He’d like for a clean showing on both sides.
“Offensively, we want to play clean football. We’ll play with a ton of tempo, really aggressive. That’s critically important while taking care of the football,” Lebby said. “Defensively, it’s all about getting the ball, and getting off the field on third down. That’s what we want to clean up before we get live on Sunday.”
