Post Game Reactions
Evan: Yeesh. When it’s so bad that my Mississippi State friends don’t even text me to trash talk… that’s bad. I can’t remember a game where Tech played worse on both sides of the ball for the entire 60 minutes. Sure, we’ve had games where the defense got crushed by superior talent; but in those games, the offense has been able to move the ball at least a little bit. This year’s team seems to be getting worse with time, and I don’t quite understand why. Look, I get it. Mississippi State is good this year, but our offense was terrible all night. And the defense made Nick Fitzgerald look like a damn Super Bowl MVP out there. Yikes.
Nathan: I didn’t expect much, but I was still disappointed. Nothing clicked on either side of the ball the whole game. I feel lucky that we got the three points that we did Saturday night. I could keep going, but there really isn’t too much left to say.
Matt: Did anyone really expect us to compete against an SEC school with the performances we’ve seen the last few weeks? The last few weeks have proven how AWFUL the offense is. Skating by awful CUSA teams wasn’t enough to convince me this would be remotely competitive. And it wasn’t.
Josh: “I sure hope Tech football doesn’t make me sad this weekend!” Well guess what Tech football did? Listen, I didn’t expect to win this game going into it, but got dammit I expected us to not look like dog poo. Our offense has been on a downward trend since the end of September and I have no idea why it has taken such a step back. I pretty much stopped watching the TV with the Tech game on after halftime in order to watch LSU get smashed by Alabama (lol). Call me what you may, but the team is not playing football that I’m interested in watching lately outside of Ferguson and Amik. Just a disappointment in every aspect.
Daniel A: I haven’t had any worthwhile football thoughts in ages.
Daniel S: I wasn’t able to watch the game, so at least I was spared from all the death.
Did Tech Die?
Evan: I would give a eulogy at the funeral, but I too have died as a result of the game. Rest in Peace, me.
Nathan: Tech passed away. The team lost their life. The Bulldogs expired. The group met their end. The football team laid down their life. They perished. Skip and the gang went to meet their maker. They passed on. The Dogs crossed the great divide. Louisiana Tech gave up the ghost. The young men kicked the bucket. They all croaked. The crew bit the big one. Yes, Tech died.
Josh: “BRING OUT YOUR DEAD! BRING OUT YOUR DEAD!”
Player of the Game
Tech Record Predictor
Contest Recap
In weeks like this, it’s not easy for me to grade the contest and write about Tech sports. Losing by 42 points is just not good for morale here amongst the gtpdd troops.
With that being said, everyone that played the contest this week did at least as good as Tech did against Mississippi State. The lowest scorers still had at least 3 points. We had 26 players who put up an average of 9.03 points, so it was definitely a down week, in part due to the magnitude of Mississippi State’s victory.
Our big winner this week was #3 Dom Brown, who scored 15 points! This is Dom’s first victory on the season, and it catapulted him up into third place, and in prime position to lock up a playoff spot this week.
Let’s talk playoffs for a sec. As stated at the beginning of the season, the playoff entrants will be the top 4 players going into Tech’s Week 11 game at Southern Miss. So that means we have one week left of the “regular season” Contests. The format of the playoffs will be: Everyone does the regular, 25 point contest. I will then send the four playoff contenders special editions of the contest that only they get to do. The #1 seed and #4 seed will have a unique set of questions to answer. Same for the #2 and #3 seeds. Whoever wins each matchup moves on to the championship. Those special contests will not add any points to the totals. If the playoff entrants want to continue to compete for the regular season points title, they’ll need to do the regular season contest as well.
Okay, hopefully that made a little sense. Here’s the current top 10!
- #1 JC (111)
- #2 Steveyti (110)
- #3 Dom Brown (106)
- #4 Daniel Adams (105)
- #5 Mikey Spikey (101)
- #6 Wild Card (99)
- #7 Reece Aultman (98)
- #8 Hayden Hicks (97)
- #8 Nathan (97)
- #10 Contest Czar (96)
Questions 1 & 2: Who will win, and by how much?
Answer: Mississippi State, by 42. 15 of 26 entrants picked Mississippi State to win, but only one scored any points due to the sheer ass-whooping the Cowbells put on the Dogs. #21 Shelby had MSU by 35, and picked up 2 points.
Question 3: How many completed passes will both teams have in the game, combined?
Answer: J’Mar completed 14 passes, and Nick Fitzgerald completed 17, for a grand total of 31. No one got this exactly right, but #6 Wild Card and #17 Chase Patterson both guessed 32 and scored full points.
Question 4: How many total yards will Tech gain on first down plays?
Answer: Tech gained 84 yards on first downs. Most people guessed within the 50 yards necessary to pick up some points (21 of 26 scored at least something here), and 4 players got full points for being within 5 yards: #10 Contest Czar, #14 Jaret Gillum, #1 JC, and #5 Mikey Spikey.
Question 5: Which team will punt first in the second half?
Answer: Both teams punted on their first possessions of the second half, but Tech possessed the ball first. 81% of respondents got this correct.
Question 6: Which of the following will be true: Either team will have a drive of 13 plays or longer; Fitzgerald will have at least 200 passing yards; Veal will lead Tech in receptions; Tech will have a greater than 25% chance to win at any time on the FPI win percentage chart.
Answer: 1) State and Tech each had drives of 15 plays (TRUE); Fitz had 243 passing yards (TRUE); Veal only had two receptions, while CeeJay Powell had four (FALSE); Tech’s greatest chance to win was 4.5%, right before the game started (FALSE). Only one player had all four of these correct, and it ended up making the difference in the game. #3 Dom Brown got em all right.
Bonus: Plot the hometowns of each scorer on a map. Is the geographic midpoint east or west of the Mississippi River?
Answer: So you’d think the fact that Mississippi State, a team east of the River, beating the crap out of the team from the west side of the River would bias the result eastward, right? Well, let’s take a look.
Here are the hometowns of all scorers:
- Bailey Hale: Iowa Park, TX
- Guidry: New Roads, LA
- Thomas: Memphis, TN
- Hill: Columbus, MS
- Christmann: Houston, TX
- Jackson: Petal, MS
- Williams: West Point, MS
- Thompson: New Orleans, LA
And here’s how those cities map out:
The geographic midpoint of the eight hometowns is the sprawling megalopolis of Delhi, Louisiana, some 40 miles west of the Mississippi. Fun fact about Dehli: it’s pretty close to where Ulysses Grant spent the winter before invading Vicksburg in 1863. You know, the Ulysses Grant whose Papers are now housed at Mississippi State? Shout out to Bailey Hale’s hometown of Iowa Park, TX for being the outlier that pulled the midpoint west.
As always, head to the Standings Page to see how you did this week!