Jackson Free Press

Our crazed Cajun correspondent Fester sounds off with a postseason postmortem on Mississippi State and a sneak peek at the bowl opponents for Southern Miss and Ole Miss (snore).

Jackal Sinks In SEC West
King Jackie hung the first winless Southeastern Conference season since 1988 season with the 12-24 relinquishing of the Egg Bowl Trophy to Ole Miss on Thanksgiving night. Same song, different verse — turnovers, critical drive-killing and drive-sustaining penalties, punt coverage ineptitude. It looks as if the Jackie-resigns-prior-to-the-Egg-Bowl crowd got it all wrong. Maybe they meant before the NCAA hammer comes down next month. Or before the disastrous recruiting class inks in February. Or on the eve of the spring game. For the second time in three MSU games, officials rounded up both teams on the field and gave them the "play-purty" warning. Memo to Jackie: That's YOUR job. The 3-9 and 0-8 finish was the worst in Jackie's 12-year StarkVegas tenure and the first nine-loss season of his 25-year head coaching career.

Southern Miss Bowl Foe: Oklahoma State (Houston Bowl, Nov. 27)
Oklahoma State beat Oklahoma and Nebraska in the same season for the first time in school history. OU's Bob Stoops is now 7-1 against Top 10 opponents and 2-2 vs. Oklahoma State. The 32-28 win in Stillwater on Nov. 30 was OSU's fifth win in eight years over the Sooners and marked the first time in the 49-game Stoops era that Oklahoma never had a lead.

Ole Miss Bowl Foe: Nebraska (Independence Bowl, Nov. 27)
Good gracious, where do we start? The 7-6, 3-5 Big 12 season represented the most Husker losses since 1961 and a losing conference record for the first time since a 3-4 effort in 1968. For the first time since 1990, Nebraska did not beat a ranked opponent. A string of 33 consecutive nine-win seasons came to a resounding thud. A 27-24 loss to Texas on Nov. 2 snapped a 26-game home winning streak. All this and they still lead the Big 12 and rank third nationally in rushing at 274 yards a game. Frank Midget Solich has survived this (three of his assistants didn't), but this is his mulligan.