'God bless the South': Inside Zach Arnett's vision for Mississippi State post Mike Leach | Toppmeyer
STARKVILE, Miss. – Zach Arnett and Zac Selmon joined the hundreds of attendees at Dak Prescott’s charity gala in May in Dallas.
Representing for Prescott is part of the job for Mississippi State’s football coach and its athletic director. Several Sports Illustrated magazine covers featuring Prescott decorate MSU’s football facility, and Arnett touts the now NFL quarterback’s achievements as proof of what’s possible for State athletes.
But, truth be told, galas in metropolitans aren’t really Arnett’s thing.
“I could tell Zach was out of place,” Selmon recalled earlier this summer.
“He’s like, ‘I would have rather been in the Delta.’ ”
There’s no telling how Arnett, 36, will fare as a rookie coach taking on one of the SEC’s most challenging jobs. But, there’s no debating he's tailored for MSU's brand.
“He believes in having a gritty football team that’s going to scratch and claw and fight,” said Matt Brock, whom Arnett promoted from linebackers coach to defensive coordinator, “and that, I think, marries up pretty well with Mississippi State.”
Arnett earned acclaim as Mike Leach’s defensive coordinator the past three seasons. For all the talk of Leach’s Air Raid, the Bulldogs’ 9-4 record last season was a testament to Arnett’s aggressive defense.
Leach died of heart complications in December, and Arnett became a sort of glue for a program facing a difficult transition. MSU fast-tracked Arnett from interim coach to the head job. He led State to an emotional ReliaQuest Bowl victory over Illinois, just three weeks after the Bulldogs lost their coach. You’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who believes Arnett wasn’t the right hire for the moment.
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“He knows us,” veteran quarterback Will Rogers said. “He knows guys in the locker room. I think he bleeds Mississippi State.”
Nevertheless, Arnett’s first head coaching job, at any level, comes at a program that has achieved a winning conference record once this millennium.
Arnett knows the history, and he’s aware other SEC programs enjoy greater financial riches. In rebuttal, he cites MSU’s 13 straight bowl game appearances, and he considers its recruiting footprint an advantage.
Arnett’s mantra: No excuses. Find a way.
Evaluate talent. Then, win or go home
Arnett’s program vision centers on precise talent evaluation and winning recruiting battles within 300 miles of campus. Inside that footprint, he says, is all the talent MSU needs to build a roster capable of qualifying for a 12-team College Football Playoff.
Emmanuel Forbes is a case in point, he says. A four-star cornerback prospect from Grenada, Mississippi, Forbes became an All-American at MSU. In April, Washington selected Forbes in the NFL Draft’s first round.
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Then there’s Prescott.
A three-star recruit from Louisiana, Prescott catapulted State to rare air during the Dan Mullen era. The 10-win 2014 Bulldogs highlighted by those SI covers would have qualified for a 12-team CFP.
“It can be done,” Arnett says. “There’s all kinds of young men in this state, Alabama, Louisiana, and across this region that are better players than their rankings say they are. That’s why we’ve got to do a great job of evaluation.”
Arnett admired Leach’s career, and he cherishes a succinct handout of coaching advice Leach authored and gave to his assistants.
Arnett won’t replicate Leach’s idiosyncratic monologues, and he’s more tactful while opining on topics outside of football, but, like his predecessor, Arnett’s interests extend outside the lines.
During an hourlong interview in June inside Arnett’s office, we sidetracked from football to discuss author J.K. Rowling, bourbon, politics and income-tax rates.
Arnett is a New Mexico native by birth and a Southerner by choice.
Employment opportunities transported Arnett, during a two-week span in 2020, from San Diego State to Syracuse (for a matter of days) to Mississippi State.
“Tax rates in California, New York and Mississippi that year, I can tell you which one is the taxpayers’ preferred state," Arnett muses. "God bless the South."
Whenever I sit down with a coach for the first time, I ask each the same question: What motivates you?
Sometimes, that question reveals insights into a coach’s psyche. Other times, coaches offer a string of clichés.
No coach has answered quite like Arnett.
“Winning,” he said matter-of-factly. “I think some of this stuff gets too existential. I like having a job. I’ve got a wife and two kids, so I got to have a job. In this job, you don’t keep your job unless you win.”
This blue-collar ball coach suits Mississippi State like a pair of work jeans.
New scheme for quarterback Will Rogers
Kevin Barbay didn’t know Arnett well before becoming his offensive coordinator, and he only interacted with Leach a couple of times. But, Barbay had been close friends with Dave Nichol, the former MSU wide receivers coach who died in 2022. Nichol also coached under Leach at Washington State.
So, Barbay felt fate tugging him to MSU when Arnett targeted him for his staff.
“It really kind of hit me in my soul, like this is meant to be,” Barbay said.
Running the Air Raid, Leach became one of college football’s top offensive minds. His teams often punched above their weight.
Every scheme features pros and cons. Leach’s pass-heavy Air Raid relied on spacing, discipline and execution to find holes in defenses. SEC defenses often countered, though, by dropping eight defenders into pass coverage, and MSU produced a limited number of explosive plays.
Barbay’s offense includes some Air Raid principles – many schemes do – but MSU will become more balanced. Some within the program even describe it as a run-first offense.
Tight ends will be incorporated, and expect an uptick in play-action passes and downfield shots. Formations and splits will vary. Rogers will be asked to be more mobile, an assignment he welcomes. Run-pass option plays, which are popular in college offenses, were absent from Leach’s system. Barbay’s offense incorporates RPOs.
Rogers and Leach developed a close relationship, and the senior's 10,689 passing yards stand as MSU's record. But, he embraced this offensive evolution.
“With how we’re running the ball, all our different motions, all our different shifts, we have certain plays that are designed to throw the ball down the field – I’m looking forward to that,” Rogers said.
Barbay considers himself the perpetual underdog, and Arnett admires his ascent. Barbay, 40, went from Texas high school coach to off-field staffer for Jim McElwain to offensive coordinator at Central Michigan and Appalachian State.
“It was pretty damn evident that Kevin Barbay fit this place,” Arnett said. “Let’s call it what it is, name me a lot of guys who come from the traditional bluebloods who find themselves at Mississippi State.”
The SEC is particularly insular. Coaches can make a career bouncing from school to school. It’s notable, then, that neither Arnett, Barbay nor Brock – the top-ranking members on this coaching staff – worked an on-field position in the SEC before arriving at MSU.
Oh, and Rogers is a Brandon, Mississippi, native who grew up rooting for Ole Miss but now oozes a fierce Bulldogs loyalty after the Rebels never offered him a scholarship.
Tell me this doesn’t sound like a casting director’s choice for an MSU football story.
Mississippi State’s redirect under Zach Arnett plus Zac Selmon
The Bulldogs hired Selmon, 37, in January. He wasn't involved in promoting Arnett, but he’s seen enough of the coach’s leadership to describe it as “a masterclass of how you connect with young players.”
Leach and former MSU AD John Cohen were a generation older than their successors. Perhaps, MSU will accumulate momentum behind a youthful energy.
Part of Selmon’s job entails affording Arnett tools for success. In this era, that loosely translates to NIL dollars.
When Cohen left MSU, his alma mater, last fall to become Auburn’s AD, AU's superior NIL collective was widely viewed as a key motivation.
Selmon arrived intent on changing the status quo.
“When we got here, we were probably behind (in NIL) compared to some peers,” said Selmon, the former Oklahoma deputy AD whose dad and uncles were Sooners football stars in the 1970s.
“I feel like, over the last couple of months, we’ve really been able to catch up. I think our fan base has responded.”
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Like Arnett, Selmon possesses a chip-on-the-shoulder mindset that coalesces with MSU. Selmon ascribes his mentality to having played football for Wake Forest, which, like MSU, is rarely viewed as a conference power.
The media picked Wake Forest to finish last in its division before Selmon’s junior season in 2006.
“We couldn’t even get our parents to watch us play,” Selmon said. “My parents were at Golden Corral instead of watching us play a game.”
His parents seriously skipped a game in favor of Golden Corral?
“It was steak night at Golden Corral,” Selmon quips. “That was a big deal in some households.”
Wake Forest won the ACC Championship that season.
Now, Selmon optimistically plans for a future in which MSU exceeds historical norms. He’s working with government officials to prepare MSU, Starkville and the state for the possibility of qualifying for and hosting a first-round CFP game after the playoff expands to 12 teams in 2024.
“Maybe I’m a hopeless romantic,” Selmon says, “but I was also on a Wake Forest team that” beat the odds.
If the Bulldogs do the same under Arnett, swanky galas probably won't be part of the celebration.
Blake Toppmeyer is the USA TODAY Network's SEC Columnist. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter @btoppmeyer.
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY NETWORK: Inside Zach Arnett's vision for Mississippi State football: 'God bless the South'
