Good morning, Bulldogs! It’s time to make a first impression, folks!

7 pm tonight at The Dude. Be there!

What else do we have brewing today?

⚾️ The New Era Begins
🇺🇸 Earning Her (Stars &) Stripes
📚 Aced It
🐶 And much, much more!

Have you ever bought that ballcap that fits just right?

You know, the one that ends up on your head, no matter how many other hats you get? It’s like it was meant for you.

I can’t help but think that an M-over-S hat is perfectly designed for the noggin of new Mississippi State head baseball coach Brian O’Connor. One of the most successful leaders in the history of college baseball has now taken over our historic program, and it certainly feels like a match made in baseball heaven.

Here’s Mississippi State – a place that has reached the College World Series 12 times, including at least one trip to Omaha in six consecutive decades. Only four programs in NCAA history can claim that.

There’s the 2021 National Championship. There’s the 83 All-Americans and the 71 players that have gone from State to the Show. There’s the Southeastern Conference’s only two triple crown winners, the SEC’s all-time hits king, the best ballpark in the country and the list goes on and on and on.

Now, here to steer the ship is O’Connor who boasts one of the best resumes in the history of the game. He’s an American Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Famer that earned that distinction by becoming one of the most successful men to ever guide a team.

The last 22 seasons, O’Connor’s leadership made Virginia baseball annually anticipate a June trip to Nebraska. That’s what happens when you oversee seven different College World Series teams and win the whole thing in 2015.

None of that is to even mention all the ACC championships, the 13 seasons with 40 or more victories, the 102 Major League Baseball Draft selections coached or any of the other pieces of O’Connor’s history that simply make you say, ‘Wow!’

There’s just no other way to look at it. MSU Director of Athletics Zac Selmon’s hire of O’Connor has brought together a storied program that expects excellence with a coach that demands it. Mississippi State and its tradition and the passion that exists in Starkville is an ideal home for a coach like O’Connor, and someone with the track record of O’Connor is precisely who should be at the helm at Dudy Noble Field.

Want to welcome O’Connor to Mississippi State? Of course you do!  Join us tonight at 7 p.m. at The Dude for the O’Conner Era Welcome Event and say you were there to help usher in this new, exciting chapter of MSU baseball.

Plus, to support O’Connor and the Diamond Dawgs even further, contact the Bulldog Club and donate to the State Excellence Fund’s Coach O’Connor campaign by September 15 to receive a one-of-a-kind gift celebrating this memorable moment in Mississippi State baseball history. Items include commemorative baseballs, pennants, mini bats, coolers, cowbells and jerseys.

We’ve said it before in this space, and we’ll say it again: it’s a great day to be a Bulldog!

Hail State!

(Coleman’s Corner is brought to you each Thursday by Mississippi State athletics senior writer Joel Coleman. A 2007 and 2009 graduate of Mississippi State, Coleman has worked inside and around MSU sports for nearly two decades with prior stops also including the Starkville Daily News and Sports Illustrated.)

📈 STOCK UP

🔼 Aced It. On the court, MSU junior Petar Jovanovic served up plenty of aces.

Those aces weren’t reserved for just the court as he became the first Mississippi state men’s tennis player since 2019 to earn Academic All-America honors on Wednesday.

Jovanovic continues to add to his impressive list of academic honors for the 2024-25 season. In his junior year, he was named an Academic All-American, earned the NCAA Elite 90 Award, and was named the SEC Scholar-Athlete. ITA & SEC Academic honors will be released at a later date.

To be named an Academic All-American, each student-athlete must have a minimum 3.50 GPA and meet high athletic standards. Following the Academic All-District recognition, a select group of students advance to a national ballot for a chance to be a part of the seven-member All-America team. Of those seven honorees, one is chosen as the Academic All-American of the Year.

🔼 Earning Her (Stars &) Stripes. Add another line to Avery Weed’s 2024-25 resume.

On Wednesday, Weed earned her second All-American accolade of the season, being named a Golfweek Third Team All-American.

Weed led the Bulldogs with a 71.67 scoring average this season, the sixth-best single-season scoring average in program history. Weed picked up her first collegiate victory at the Mason Rudolph Championship in the fall. She then concluded the fall with her second individual victory at Old Waverly Golf Club in The Ally, where she tied an NCAA record with an 11-under round in the opening day.

Weed becomes just the fifth Bulldog to earn All-American honors from Golfweek, joining Julia Lopez Ramirez, Ally McDonald, Ashley Gillam and Jessica Peng. This also marks the fourth-consecutive season a Bulldog had earned an All-American honor from Golfweek.

🔼 One For The Ages. We have 86 days until Mississippi State football’s season opener at Southern Miss on August 30!

Today we’re throwing it back to September 13, 1986, when quarterback Don Smith and the Bulldogs took down No. 8 Tennessee in Knoxville, 27-23!

🤔 BULLDOG TRIVIA

During his Hall of Fame career at Mississippi State, how many TD passes did Don Smith throw for the Bulldogs?

Got a guess? 

Scroll to the bottom of the Bulldog Brew to see if you know your stuff!

🤝 SHARE THE BREW

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📆 LOOKING AHEAD

Wednesday, June 11 — Saturday, June 14
👟 Track & Field at NCAA Outdoor Championships (Eugene, Ore.)

🐶 Click here to see the full Mississippi State Athletics Calendar

🎉 TRIVIA ANSWER

Answer: 31

🐶 Have a great Thursday, y’all!