Mississippi State Football: Jeff Lebby Discusses SEC Chaos, Recruiting, and Georgia

At his weekly press conference, Mississippi State’s Jeff Lebby covers recruiting updates, game strategy for Georgia, and lessons from SEC upsets

Mississippi State Bulldogs head coach Jeff Lebby against the Arizona State Sun Devils at Mountain America Stadium. / Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images

STARKVILLE, Miss. – Mississippi State football coach Jeff Lebby met with the media for his weekly press conference on Monday morning.

Lebby talked about a wide range of issues from the craziness of last Saturday to recruiting trail news to the Bulldogs’ upcoming opponent.

Here are some of the highlights from his press conference:

Kind of a wild weekend in the Southeastern Conference this past weekend. How can you use that to kind of motivate your guys so they know something crazy could happen here, too?

Yeah, I think for us, it's still about what we do with our time and how we practice, how we meet, how we walk through that is, to me, what it's all about. That is what will give us a chance to go play the best ball that we've played. Our focus is on us and making sure we're doing everything we can to be the best version of us Saturday at 3:15 in Athens.

How difficult was it for you a couple weeks ago to kind of slow it down and play a little bit more of a controlled pace?

I think for me, it's all about what is the thing that creates an advantage? And that's going to be week-to-week as we move forward and understanding what we're getting on both sides of the ball and in special teams.

What's been the message to your team in recruiting right now to try to build this program up despite, you know, being on a losing streak and going through some tough times early?

I think again, it's about laying a foundation. It's about understanding that where we are today is completely different than where we're planning on going, and there is this great vision of where we're going to end up.

This Saturday, and moving forward, first look on film study, what stands out to you the most about this Georgia team?

They're really good in all three phases. They have done an unbelievable job building a program to sustain and I think you watch them, regardless of who is in the game, the expectation is for that guy to get done exactly what the starter was trying to get done.