Mississippi State QB Blake Shapen Prepared for Jump to SEC

Mississippi State's transfer quarterback is ready to hit the ground running in a new conference.

Mississippi State quarterback Blake Shapen (2) at Mississippi State's spring game. / Justin Ford/Getty Images

DALLAS— New Mississippi State coach Jeff Lebby is in the early midst of his first overall stint as a head coach after taking over for Zach Arnett. The accomplished former Big 12 and SEC coordinator set finding the right quarterback as one of his key goals entering the 2024 season. With Baylor transfer Blake Shapen, Lebby believes that task has been accomplished.

"We've got our guy," Lebby said Wednesday at SEC Media Days. "I could not be more proud of how Blake has gone about his business, how he does what he does every single day. I think when you talk about what we're going to look like from a team standpoint, it's real similar to what we're going to look like at that position: Toughness, physicality, edge, being able to go inspire your teammates to go play better every single day, and that's what Blake has done."

The 23-year-old Shapen spent the past four seasons in Waco, where he was MVP of the 2021 Big 12 Championship Game against Oklahoma State before winning the full-time quarterback job in 2022. He gained a substantial amount of Power Four experience, making him uniquely suited to take over the post vacated by Will Rogers, who became a figurehead of the Bulldogs' program over the last several years. He has prioritized building relationships with his teammates on and off the field in order to mesh as well as possible.

"I think at first it was tough because I was at Baylor for four years and it's just a new place, new relationships and being able to build relationships outside of the facility," Shapen said on Wednesday. "Hanging out outside of the facility, it's a big deal. You have to build these relationships before the season. You can't just go on to the field and play with somebody you really don't know. So just hanging out, doing regular things like regular dudes do, I guess, and just building those relationships."

Shapen threw for 5,574 yards across three collegiate seasons where he saw action. With that comes a career 63.7 completion percentage, a ratio of 36 touchdowns to 13 interceptions and a 138.3 rating. While those numbers were all accrued in the Big 12, he's looking forward to the next step, as competing in the SEC was something he wanted to do when he made the decision to transfer.

"I wanted to play in the SEC, and I heard Mississippi State is a great place so it was a no-brainer," he said. His relationship with Lebby was also a driving force in him opting to come to Starkville, even though he had phone conversations with the likes of South Carolina and Nebraska. "He's a cool dude but he's very knowledgeable about football and offense and having an explosive offense," Shapen said. "A lot of people gravitate toward him just by the way he is, his personality. He's a great guy."

Lebby believes Shapen has been instrumental to have in his first year at the helm of a program, particularly when one examines the fact that the Mississippi State roster will have several new faces who will be gaining experience as the season goes along.

"He's put us in a position to get off the ground the way we need to. When I watched him play, I said that's our kind of guy, that's my kind of guy, so having him year one has been huge," said Lebby.

The quarterback expects to see a different style of play in the SEC than he's used to from his time at Baylor, but he feels ready. That goes for both offense and defense. He anticipates defenses testing athleticism more, as opposed to seeing zone defense more commonly in the Big 12 than the SEC. "It's been a process, definitely a learning process," Shapen said of the new system. "I was in a pro-style offense at Baylor, transition[ing] to a more up-tempo, spread-out offense... You're under center at Baylor more than you are here. We're not really under center much. There's not a lot of RPOs at Baylor. Here, we run a lot of RPOs." He has experienced the new SEC venues at Texas and Oklahoma. Shapen expects the challenges those bring, not just because he's seen them before, but because in his view, the SEC is the best league in college football.

Above all, both Shapen and Lebby are excited for the new opportunities provided by a revamped SEC and the new 12-team College Football Playoff, which goes into effect this season. "I think for all of college football, the excitement in the fan bases, for us, specifically Mississippi State, I think it opens a door and it creates a door," said Lebby. "We'll always and forever make sure that we're talking about maximizing every day, every opportunity, every single season and fighting like heck to be in that top 12." Shapen wants to use preseason expectations as fuel for himself and his teammates to have success.

"I think we all use that as fuel. We're looked at -- there is not a lot of expectations at the end of the day for us," he said. "So, I feel like that fuels us in a way that makes us want to go out there and prove a lot of people wrong, and I'm excited."