Mississippi State’s run defense rises, but Texas A&M’s three-headed attack awaits

The Bulldogs limited Tennessee on the ground, but can they stop Texas A&M’s three-headed rushing attack led by Le’Veon Moss?

Mississippi State Defensive Lineman Jamil Burroughs (#88) during the game between the Tennessee Volunteers and the Mississippi State Bulldogs at Davis Wade Stadium at Scott Field in Starkville, MS. | Mississippi State Athletics

Heading into last week’s game, there were questions about Mississippi State’s ability to stop opposing offenses from running the ball.

Those questions were answered Saturday against No. 15 Tennessee.

With the exception of one play, the Bulldogs were great at stopping the run.

The Volunteers ran the ball 32 times for 131 yards (4.1 yards per carry) and two touchdowns. That’s a massive improvement on the 250-plus yards the Bulldogs gave up in its only other game against a Power 4 team (Arizona State).

“I feel like we did pretty good against the run,” defensive tackle Kedrick Bingley-Jones said Monday. “And one of our main goals in our d-tackle’s room is to stop the run. That's our first goal. I feel like we did a pretty good job executing. Hated that in overtime, we weren’t able to execute as well and they got the long run. But that was like their only explosive run that they had during the game.”

That one explosive run play was the only play the Volunteers ran in overtime.

Desean Bishop took the handoff designed to go up the middle, but Bishop saw a hole to his left and only one Bulldog with a chance to make a tackle, Zakari Tillman.

DeSean would not be denied 😤

delivered the deciding score in OT pic.twitter.com/5N5m9vrffV

— Tennessee Football (@Vol_Football) September 28, 2025

Tillman, who had been having one his best games in college until then, attempted to tackle Bishop, but the Volunteer slipped from Tillman’s grasp and ran in for the score.

“I got to be better,” Tillman said after Saturday’s game. “I had to go make that tackle.

“A lot of anger in the locker room after this one.”

That’s a good thing because the Bulldogs face another team that’s good at running the ball. (Spoiler: This is going to be a common theme the rest of the season, including Arkansas despite its coach being fired Sunday.)

No. 6 Texas A&M is averaging 169.5 yards per game, which ranks 10th in the SEC and 61 in FBS. The Aggies have something a three-headed rushing attack, led by Le’Veon Moss with 307 yards on 54 carries (5.7 ypc) with five touchdowns.

Rueben Owens II is averaging 7.4 ypc and quarterback Marcel Reed has 119 rushing yards and a touchdown.

“They've got two really, really good running backs,” Mississippi State coach Jeff Lebby said. “And they've got a veteran offensive line that's played a lot of ball.”

Texas A&M does return its entire starting offensive line from last year, that does include preseason All-American Ar’maj Reed-Adams and half of which was named to the 2025 Outland Trophy Watchlist.

No major game plan secrets were revealed (I’m not sure they even had game plans finalized when the Monday press conferences were held), but Bingley-Jones did talk about what it’ll take to slow down the Aggies.

“We got to be able to gap up the run, because they got two talented running backs,” he said. “I think our biggest challenge is just being able to gap up the run to try and make them one dimensional, and also be able to contain Marcel Reed, because he's a good runner too.”

For whatever it’s worth, Mississippi State’s defense is now allowing an average of 135.4 rushing yards per game that ranks 11th in the SEC and 63rd in FBS.

And there’ll be more factors that decides this game’s winner, like the Aggies’ talented receiver duo and penalties.

But stopping the run will be a huge help for Mississippi State.