{"id":17201,"date":"2018-09-30T12:17:00","date_gmt":"2018-09-30T16:17:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lwosoncfb.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/?p=17201"},"modified":"2025-09-13T16:03:14","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T20:03:14","slug":"dan-mullen-and-the-florida-gators-upset-mississippi-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/2018\/09\/30\/dan-mullen-and-the-florida-gators-upset-mississippi-state\/","title":{"rendered":"Dan Mullen and the Florida Gators Upset #23 Mississippi State 13-6"},"content":{"rendered":"

It was great to be a Florida Gator Saturday night. And it was even better to be\u00a0Dan Mullen<\/a><\/strong> as the Florida knocked off his former team, the Mississippi State Bulldogs. The Gators went into Starkville and came out on top in a 13-6 ballgame. The Gators defense continues to dominate as they had six sacks on the night and 8.5 tackles for loss. The only touchdown in the game was a trick play; Florida ran a double pass from Feleipe Franks<\/a><\/strong> to Kadarius Toney<\/a><\/strong> who found Moral Stephens<\/a><\/strong> in the end zone for six. Florida also held Bulldogs QB Nick Fitzgerald<\/a><\/strong> to under 100 passing and rushing yards. Here is the recap for the game:\u00a0Florida Gators Upset #23 Mississippi State 13-6<\/p>\n

Mississippi State Bulldogs<\/h3>\n

It was another tough loss for the Mississippi State Bulldogs as they lose to their former head coach. The Dawgs have given up two games in a row after losing to Kentucky last Saturday. Quarterback Nick Fitzgerald<\/strong><\/a> had a night to forget as he completed 11 out of 26 passes for 98 yards and no touchdowns. Fitzgerald also had 20 carries for only 32 yards against the Florida front seven. Kylin Hill<\/a><\/strong> was the leader for the Bulldogs as he had nine carries for 41 yards. Osirus Mitchell<\/a><\/strong> was the lead receiver for Mississippi State as he had three catches for 35 yards.<\/p>\n

The Mississippi State defense had a decent game; they were able to hold Florida to under 20 points. Erroll Thompson<\/strong> led both teams in tackles with fourteen and also had 0.5 of a tackle for loss. Gerri Green<\/a><\/strong> had four tackles including a sack and 1.5 tackles for loss. Montez Sweat<\/a><\/strong> and Jeffery Simmons<\/a><\/strong> both had four tackles in the game but neither of them had a tackle for loss. Cameron Dantzler<\/a><\/strong> had five tackles in the game and also picked off Gators QB Feleipe\u00a0Franks.<\/p>\n

Florida Gators<\/h3>\n

The Florida Gators get another tough road win in a hostile environment. There wasn\u2019t much offense on either side, but Florida did just enough for the win. Quarterback Feleipe Franks completed 22 out of 31 passes for 219 yards, no touchdowns but an interception. Junior running back Lamical Perine<\/a><\/strong> led the team in rushing with ten carries for 55 yards. Kadarius Toney<\/strong><\/a> had a big night as he had two carries for 20 yards and 20-yard touchdown pass on the double pass. Josh Hammond<\/a><\/strong> led the Gators in receiving with three catches for 47 yards. Trevon Grimes<\/a><\/strong> had four receptions for 34 yards, and tight end Moral Stephens<\/strong><\/a> caught a 20-yard touchdown pass from Toney.<\/p>\n

On defense, the Florida Gators defense continue to have great game on the road. Florida didn\u2019t force any turnovers, but they did have six sacks on the night. Junior defensive Jachai Polite<\/a><\/strong> had a monster game with three tackles and two sacks. Vosean Joseph<\/a><\/strong> led the Gators in tackles with seven tackles and sack. Jabari Zuniga<\/a><\/strong> had three tackles including a sack. C.J. Henderson<\/a><\/strong> continue to have big game as he was lockdown on defense and also got the quarterback. Sophomore safety Donovan Stiner<\/a><\/strong> sealed the deal as he got the final sack to put the game on ice.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s next?<\/h3>\n

The Florida Gators will be back home for a tough SEC matchup. The LSU Tigers come into the Swamp and will look to stay undefeated. The Tigers barely beat the Gators last season as LSU won 17-16 in the Swamp. You can watch this game Saturday afternoon at 3:30 pm EST on CBS Sports.<\/p>\n

Main Photo Credit:<\/p>\n

\"\"
File Photo: Joshua Tse #27 of the Florida Gators runs with the ball as Leo Lewis #10 of the Mississippi State Bulldogs. September 29, 2018 in Starkville, Mississippi. (Photo by Jonathan Bachman\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It was great to be a Florida Gator Saturday night. And it was even better to be\u00a0Dan Mullen as the Florida knocked off his former team, the Mississippi State Bulldogs. The Gators went into Starkville and came out on top in a 13-6 ballgame. The Gators defense continues to dominate as they had six sacks […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2113,"featured_media":17206,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,35585],"tags":[79,1977,244,3503,1979,315,3762,126,1198,20],"class_list":["post-17201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sec","category-mississippi-state-bulldogs","tag-college-football","tag-feleipe-franks","tag-florida-gators","tag-jachai-polite","tag-kadarius-toney","tag-mississippi-state-bulldogs","tag-moral-stephens","tag-ncaa","tag-nick-fitzgerald","tag-sec"],"modified_by":"Michael Kovacs, ADMIN","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2113"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17201"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17201\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77860,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17201\/revisions\/77860"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17206"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}