Maroon beats White in MSU’s spring game

Published 11:05 pm Saturday, April 21, 2018

STARKVILLE — New Mississippi State head coach Joe Moorhead challenged his team and the fans to elevate from ‘good to great’ all spring. The Bulldog faithful rose to the occasion as an MSU spring game record crowd of 36,789 watched Maroon defeat White, 28-10, on Saturday afternoon in Davis Wade Stadium.

The mark shattered the previous Bulldog spring game record of 36,357 in 2011. The day began with a player autograph session and continued with the first ‘Dawg Walk’ of the Moorhead era followed by the recognition of guest captains, Bulldog greats Dak Prescott, Gabe Jackson, Johnthan Banks and Fred Ross.

“I would like to thank the fans for coming out,” Moorhead said postgame. “We kind of issued a challenge to elevate from good to great and break the record, and they came out even with the baseball game change kind of splitting the crowd a little bit. So that was awesome, and it was certainly exciting to get the four captains back here. With Dak and those guys, it meant a lot to me, and it meant a lot to the program.”

Sophomore running back Kylin Hill totaled 99 all-purpose yards, rushing for 50 yards on nine carries and three touchdowns. Hill reached the endzone twice in the second quarter, scoring on runs of 9- and 2 to give Maroon a 21-7 halftime advantage.

The Columbus native accounted for the game’s final score, putting the finishing touches on Maroon’s victory with a 1-yard run in the fourth quarter.

Sophomore quarterback Keytaon Thompson played for both squads. Thompson was 19-of-31 for 254 yards in a Maroon uniform, and the New Orleans native was 7-of-13 for the White team.

Fans got a glimpse of the sure-handed redshirt freshman Austin Williams on Saturday. Williams hauled in five passes for 86 yards and one touchdown on a brilliant grab in the corner of the endzone in the second quarter from Thompson.

Nick Gibson provided the biggest play of the game, racing 51 yards for a touchdown that tied the game at seven apiece with 7:53 in the first quarter.

Maroon outgained White, 362-228, and the team’s combined for 387 yards through the air.

Defensively, Marquiss Spencer led the day with 2.5 tackles for loss, while Montez Sweat added two sacks.

Saturday culminated the first spring of the Moorhead era. The Bulldogs now turn their attention to offseason workouts and will report for preseason camp in early August.

“We are coming out on a daily basis and giving great effort, and we were executing and improving every day,” Moorhead said. “I think we have done that. I think there was another kind of snapshot of our spring today. There was great effort. There were a bunch of good things, but a million things to clean up moving forward, which is to be expected.”