I guess this means Andy Kennedy is Strong Mad.
Mississippi State hired Rick Ray to clean up their program and start smearing SEC competition. After three lackluster years, he may be able to finish the job or he may get flushed out by impatient fans.
It must have been tough to walk into Starkville to replace Rick Stansbury. It must have been tougher to release most of his team in the name of “cleaning up the program” under Athletic Director (and former UK Athletics media director) Scott Stricklin’s command. It definitely was difficult being the doormat of the SEC West, having only seven scholarship players due to transfers and injuries.
In the children’s fairytale story, the suffering endured while doing the right thing would be rewarded with hard-earned victories & success. Ray, senior I.J. Ready and junior Craig Sword would be rewarded with a breakout season in the upper-half of the SEC standings and maybe even an NCAA Tournament berth.
Rick has hope in his eyes, negating the #Creaning.
The fantasy slowly swirled down the tubes with every tight loss or “moral victory”. Patience is starting wearing thin in the Bulldog fan community. In December before SEC play began Charlie Burris, a writer for SB Nation’s MSU blog ForWhomTheCowbellTolls.com, argued that Rick Ray & his staff deserve a chance; by January 30th, Burris had flipped to firing Ray at the end of the season. As this screenshot of a poll taken March 1st shows, readers of the site are split in opinion:
More votes for
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
would have been really bad.
Ray has his supporters in the fanbase and within the SEC, including Kentucky’s John Calipari. Ray said of Calipari, “anytime we have a big win, he’s one of the first guys to reach out to me via text and tell me congratulations, and things like that. So my perception of Cal is I think he’s a genuine person. I think he really cares about coaches in this profession, and I think he wants the SEC as a whole to do well.”
Support from Calipari may not be enough to save Ray’s job at the end of the season. Some Bulldogs fans want former MSU assistant coach Kermit Davis to leave Middle Tennessee State. Others fear that if Strickin misses on Davis, they’ll be forced to get another assistant coach and restart the rebuilding process again with several more shitty years.
There’s no fairytale solution for Mississippi State. Somebody is gonna have to get knee-deep in it and just keep shoveling.
Previous This Year In SEC Articles:
* Three Underwhelming Kings (Tennessee, Auburn, South Carolina)
* Flying Tigers Grounded (Missouri)
