2016 St. Pete Bowl final score: Mississippi State beats Miami (OH) thanks to two blocked kicks

In a football game played at a baseball stadium, the St. Pete Bowl between Miami (OH) and Mississippi State resembled America’s pastime in pacing and point quantity for the first half of the proceedings. But special teams reigned supreme and the Bulldogs were able to hold on thanks to two big blocked kicks.

As Mississippi State battled back, it was QB Nick Fitzgerald that led the charge. This 44-yard TD got them in striking distance, and they’d take a 17-16 lead with a field goal in the fourth. Fitzgerald finished the game with 126 yards through the air and 132 on the ground.

The only reason the game wasn’t tied was thanks to a blocked extra point by the Bulldogs in the second quarter. And the issue would rear it’s ugly head late in the game when history repeated itself.

Things had broken just right for the RedHawks up to this point. After Fitzgerald was forced to go to the sideline for a play due to injury, the Bulldogs failed to convert on fourth down and gave the RedHawks the ball back. There’s an argument that the Bulldogs perhaps should have just kicked the field goal, or at least taken a timeout to settle things down but we’ll never know. MSU ran a play with backup QB Damian Williams and an incompletion fluttered harmlessly to the horrendous-looking turf.

Miami matriculated the ball right down the field, but couldn’t boot it through for the game winner.

Speaking of that field, remember that viewer discretion is advised. But you need to see the sorry state of affairs in Central Florida.

This game also denied us two pretty cool subplots. Mississippi State could have been the first team in modern college football to actually go 5-8 on the season, and Miami (OH) could have ended a season with seven consecutive wins after starting 0-6. Both dreams ended in St. Petersburg after the Bulldogs took a big bite out of the RedHawks.