Croom

Mississippi State coach Sylvester Croom gets a celebratory drenching by players Quinton Saulsberry (55) and Wesley Carroll after Mississippi State's 17-14 win over Ole Miss in Starkville, Miss., on Friday, Nov. 23, 2007. (AP Photo/Jim Lytle)

Sylvester Croom was exhausted. The running backs coach for the Tennessee Titans had spent the majority of the October day on at the team's football facility, studying film and preparing his players to take on the Cleveland Browns the following afternoon. Now, after driving through the dark streets of Nashville to his apartment, he collapsed onto his living room couch and turned on the television. He wanted to check on his old team.

Flipping the channels, he finally found what he was looking for: highlights of Mississippi State vs. Texas A&M, played earlier that day. What he saw caused him to go bug-eyed and gave him a full-body shiver of excitement: The Bulldogs, the team he coached from 2004 to '08, beat the Aggies 48-31 in a game that--at the time--was the most significant in school history. Watching his old school lay the wood to A&M left the 60-year-old overwhelmed with one feeling: pride.

"I still feel connected to Mississippi State because I feel like the things we did there helped build what is happening now," Croom says. "When I got to Starkville the program needed some major changes. We emphasized two things with our players: character and academics. That was how we were going to build. I told the players we recruited that it may take seven or eight years to get Mississippi State to a level where we could contend for an SEC championship and a national championship. We didn't it done when I was there. But it's extremely gratifying to see it is happening now. The fans in Mississippi deserve it."

Back when he was hired by Mississippi State, Croom, a native of Tuscaloosa who played for Bear Bryant at Alabama, became the first African-American head football coach in the SEC. When Mike Slive announced last week that he would step down as conference commissioner in 2015, he mentioned Croom's hiring as one of the proudest moments of his tenure.

In the midst of the current euphoria in Starkville, which is just giddy over its team national No. 1 ranking, it's easy to forget or dismiss where the journey to the top began. Croom inherited a program that was in the grip of NCAA sanctions, yet in his third season he led the Bulldogs to an 8-5 record and a victory in Liberty Bowl. He was named the SEC coach of the year--the first Mississippi State coach to win the award since Charlie Shira in 1970.

But things fell apart quickly: Just a year later, after the Bulldogs stumbled to a 4-8 record, Croom was asked to resign. In five years he was 21-38.

Yet even as he left, he sensed a sea change was coming. It was as if he whispered into the ear of his successor, Dan Mullen, the things he felt Mississippi State needed to do in order to flourish. "Upgrade the facilities, because they needed to build a place that was attractive enough to get out of state of kids," Croom says. "Keep Mississippi kids from leaving. I'm telling you, even when we weren't that good, Mississippi kids were tough physically--really, really tough. If you play Mississippi kids, you better bring your lunch pail, because they are going to hit you in mouth hard.

"Now you look at what Dan Mullin has done. They have as nice of facilities as anyone in the conference. They're getting those out of state kids and they're keeping kids in state from leaving. They are physically tough on defense and they have a heck of quarterback in Dak Prescott. That's how you win in the SEC."

Davis Wade Stadium, originally built in 1914 and the oldest stadium in the SEC, underwent a $75 million expansion that was completed in August and raised the seating capacity to 61,337. "The stadium is just perfect," Croom says. "It's big but not too big. It's a great fit for Starkville, because it feels homey, like you're among friends."

Croom receives text messages from former players nearly every day, telling him how connected they feel to this current Bulldog team. Though none of the players he personally recruited are on the roster--his last recruiting class graduated last year--Croom exudes a fatherly pride every time he watches the Bulldogs play. "The players I had made sacrifices that are now paying off," Croom says. "I'd like to think that the work ethic that we ingrained at Mississippi State is at the core of what helped build the program."

Now in the autumn of his professional career, Croom realizes that he'll most likely never again be a head coach. It's been a decade since he made history in the SEC, and the thank-yous still come his way, especially from young African American coaches. "At the time I was hired I understood the significance of being the first African American head coach in the SEC, but I didn't appreciate it because I was so focused on the job," Croom says. "But I now realize it meant a lot to a lot of people. You can look at me and say, 'If he can achieve his goal, so can I.' I'm so humbled by that. I'm grateful for the chance I got. I'll always be thankful to Mississippi State. A part of me will always be a Bulldog."