Mississippi State Faces Stark Reality

You could ask any of the members of the Mississippi State men’s basketball team if the school’s first NCAA tournament Final Four berth last spring was worth having to endure 1,327 variations on the question, is there really anything to do in Starkville?

You could ask the coach, Richard Williams, if reaching college basketball’s pinnacle was worth it, judging from the aftermath - a squad gutted by the departures of all five starters - two seniors, two juniors who left for the NBA and a fifth player who is in jail for his role in an off-campus brawl.

You could ask, but it would only show that you’re a stranger to these parts. Folks here know how their state is looked upon by much of the nation. The tone of condescending pity when describing the quality of life or the educational system; the continual rehashing of how in 1963, before the school’s first appearance in the NCAA men’s tournament, the team had to sneak across state lines to defy a legislature that banned it from playing against blacks.

But Richard Williams is a son of Mississippi, born in Vicksburg, and has spent 30 years coaching and 17 years teaching math throughout the state, from junior high to his current position at his alma mater. Tyrone Washington, the Bulldogs’ starting center, grew up in nearby Indianola. So, you can ask why there isn’t a sign on the outskirts of town trumpeting the team’s success, and they’ll tell you a sign is merely something made of wood or paper.

“Everywhere you go, there may not be signs but (the Final Four) is something that Mississippians will never forget,” said Washington. “Everybody knows. I go to the store and there are little kids who I didn’t know even knew what a basketball was saying ‘You’re Tyrone Washington - you played in the Final Four.’ My grandmother got to go to New York, someplace she’d never been before … A sign can’t mean as much as it does in your heart.”

It seems like it only happened yesterday. But the truth is the Bulldogs are in a much different place than they were last April.

As they prepare to play George Washington in the first round of the Franklin National Bank Classic today in suburban Washington, the Bulldogs are 2-2. Last Saturday, they lost at home to James Madison, 75-72. It was only Mississippi State’s fifth nonconference home loss in Williams’s 10-plus seasons.

On Tuesday night, the Bulldogs suffered a 74-43 defeat at the hands of No. 2 Wake Forest.

“We lost three underclassmen - and for a program like a Mississippi State program, that’s impossible to overcome in a year,” Williams said. “We can’t recruit that kind of depth to overcome the loss of players that had eligibility remaining. We have youngsters out there playing that we recruited to be backup players for at least a year, some of them for two years. Now all of a sudden, they’re playing important minutes for us.”

Having small forward Dontae’ Jones, the team wit and practical joker, and center Erick Dampier, the first great Mississippi high school player in years to remain in-state, leave for the NBA as first-round draft picks of the New York Knicks and Indiana Pacers would be hard enough.

But college teams have been losing talented non-seniors to the pros with increasing regularity in recent years. The more difficult loss for the Bulldogs is that of Marcus Bullard, serving a three-year sentence at the county jail in Gulfport for violating the terms of his probation after being arrested for pistol-whipping another student in a fight last July. In 1994, Bullard was placed on probation after pleading guilty to possession of cocaine with intent to distribute.

Before 1996, Mississippi State wasn’t in a lull - but it wasn’t looking down on very many opponents, either. Since Williams arrived 10 years ago, the Bulldogs had made a steady climb, moving from a 7-21 record his first season to the 1995 NCAA tournament round of 16 to last season’s inspired run, which started with an upset victory over eventual national champ Kentucky in the Southeastern Conference tournament final.

“I think this season will have its rewards - in terms of wins and losses I don’t know how many that’s going to be,” Williams said. “I know we’ve reached a point in our program where anything less than making the NCAA tournament is going to be a disappointment. And that’s the way I want it.”