Having won 22 games in a row simply wasn’t enough for the Florida St. Seminoles to retain their No. 1 position this week in The Associated Press college football poll. Nope, that honor is now bestowed upon the Mississippi State Bulldogs who just finished knocking off their third straight top-10 team as they defeated previously No. 2 Auburn 38-23 on Saturday.
The Bulldogs’ previous two victories were over then No. 8 LSU 34-29 in Baton Rouge and a 48-31 victory at home against previously No. 6 Texas A&M.
In the history of the AP poll, the Bulldogs are the first team to go from being unranked to No. 1 in five weeks. The previous record was set by Ohio State in 1954 who took six weeks.
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Coming into Saturday’s action, the Bulldogs were tied for No. 3 with fellow in-state rival Ole Miss while Florida State sat at No. 1 and Auburn at No. 2. But the Bulldogs jumped out early on Auburn taking a 21-0 lead by the end of the first quarter. The Bulldogs are now 6-0, 3-0 in the SEC.
The Bulldogs received 45 first place votes while the Seminoles (6-0, 4-0 ACC) received 12 and Ole Miss (6-0, 3-0 SEC) received three. Baylor (6-0, 3-0 Big 12), who defeated TCU in a shootout 62-59, moved up to No. 4 while Notre Dame (6-0) slid in to the No. 5 position after defeating North Carolina on Saturday 50-43.
Auburn (5-1, 2-1 SEC) fell four spots to No. 6 while Alabama (5-1, 2-1 SEC), Michigan St. (5-1, 2-0 Big 10), Oregon (5-1, 2-1 Pac-12) and Georgia (5-1, 3-1 SEC) round out the top 10.
For Mississippi State, their turnaround began back in 2009 when former Florida offensive coordinator Dan Mullen took over the program as head coach. Mullen, who was the offensive coordinator under Urban Meyer, has a coaching record of 42-28 in Starville; before that, the Bulldogs were 23-48 in the previous six seasons.
On Sunday, Mullen talked about the No. 1 ranking by saying that he’s happy everyone involved but the work isn’t done quite yet.
“I couldn’t be happier for the university, the students, the fans and the alumni,” Mullen said. “For so many years you try to accomplish something and to be able to say we’re the best at something is special. But for us as a team — they don’t give out the trophy midseason. We really haven’t accomplished all that much.”