An already tough challenge for Mississippi State and first-year head coach Jeff Lebby was made tougher when starting quarterback Blake Shapen was lost for the year to a knee injury three weeks ago against Florida.
Enter Michael Van Buren Jr., an 18-year-old true freshman to try and spring the upset Saturday against No. 5 Georgia (4:15, SEC Network).
“That's going to be an incredible challenge for a true freshman quarterback to go play the way we need him to play to give us a chance to win the game,” Lebby said. “But he's a young man that is focused on doing just that. And so, we'll continue to promote that, and there's everybody inside the walls and everybody inside that locker room's got confidence in Mike to be able to give us a chance to get done what we want to get done.”
This won’t be the first road test for the former Rivals250 player.
After completing 7 of 13 passes for 100 yards after replacing Shapen against Florida, Van Buren started the following week’s game at Texas. Although he completed a modest 12 of 23 passes for 144 yards, Van Buren did not commit any turnovers, something Lebby said needs to continue against Georgia.
“Yeah, it's a huge opportunity for him last week to have this great amount of growth after getting his first start,” Lebby said. “The expectation was for him to go play clean, take care of the football, be accurate, and have great command. There's so many things to be able to build on, but proud of who he was in the moment.”
Georgia head coach Kirby Smart gave Van Buren credit where it is due.
“I'll tell you, he got thrown into the fire quickly. I mean, in the middle of an SEC game to have to go in and play and then turn around the next week and go to Texas. That was two really tough games,” Smart said. “But he's a tremendous athlete. I think they've allowed him to do some things that he's really good at, and they're mixing the other quarterback in with quarterback run.”
At 1-4, it’s been a struggle for Mississippi State. Among their four defeats is a 41-17 beating by Toledo in Week 3.
The Bulldogs followed that up with back-to-back losses to Florida (45-28) and Texas (35-13) before last week’s open date to prepare for Georgia.
“Yeah, we needed it. There's no question about it from a health standpoint,” said Lebby, the former offensive coordinator at Oklahoma. “Again, just being able to refocus, recalibrate, and get our guys a little bit of a break that they needed, and get us back in this building with just great energy and being incredibly thankful for the opportunity that we’ve got ahead of us. We've got an incredible challenge on Saturday, but our guys are excited about it.”
Lebby is also excited to be matching up against Smart as a head coach for the first time.
“To me, he’s as good as there's ever been. I mean, as he's gotten to Georgia and now you look at what he's done over his tenure, it really is impressive. It's second to none. The amount of success he's had, the years that he's put back-to-back to back, again, it really is the standard right now in college football,” Lebby said. “To me, he's done it in a way that has been built to sustain, developing high school kids, signing great high school football players from the south, and mixing in different pieces positionally. But he's got a blueprint that is proven and it's worked.”
