Chris Jans doesn’t want his team to be known for offense or defense; he only wants to win. The SEC teams look like they’re winning it all since the season began and Mississippi State is no different. With a 10-1 record as the year ends, the Bulldogs are on the warpath to March Madness, and their latest game vs. Memphis proved it. Nevertheless, the behind-the-scenes scenario is a little different, as the coach reveals.

Sitting down on The Field of 68: After Dark, Jans discusses how this past summer he was watching players practice with another coach friend of his. Realizing then that each team in the SEC was capable of winning it all, Jans said on the show, “I’m not gonna lie to you, ask me in late January how I feel about it, I’m not sure what the answer will be.”

“There’s a lot of great teams and a whole bunch of good teams. There’s no bad teams in the SEC this year, there’s not one. There’s nobody that doesn’t think they don’t have a chance to win every single night.” The Southeastern Conference boasts teams like Arkansas, Kentucky, and Tennessee, which have ranked consistently in the top 5. And even usually overlooked Vanderbilt and South Carolina are not far behind.

It also helps that the money is also flowing in non-stop. Per Sportico, the SEC took in $852.5 million of revenue during its 2023 fiscal year, setting a new record for college athletics. By the August end of last year, one of the toughest conferences in college basketball was boasting net assets of $191 million after distributing $741 million to the 14-member school – an average of around $51.3 million per school after excluding bowl expenses.

It might be one reason for better performance from the entire conference and it’s appeared as a wrench in Chris Jans’ plans. The third-year coach at Mississippi knows, “From a quad perspective, that’s cool. It’s awesome, it’s exciting, but from a winning game perspective, it’s pretty daunting. If I was ya’ll I’d be like, ‘Heck yeah, I can’t wait to see it unfold.’ But from my chair, it’s a little intimidating at times.”

The Mississippi Bulldogs have changed their play style a bit this year, with Tee Bartlett joining in in November and despite his size, Jans has focused on his passing skills. There is Josh Hubbard, KeShawn Murphy, and Michael Nwoko, but Kanye Clary is out. The defense and offense have changed but the head coach is still excited to be in the SEC.

Chris Jans “loves being in the SEC” despite the heavy competition

Before the 2024-25 season officially began, Chris Jans sat down with SEC Sports in October on Mississippi’s media day availability. And even though he knows his team plays in a tough conference where the schedule will have some sweating bullets, all Jans wants is his still new-ish team to win.

“I love it. I love being in the SEC,” the head coach said in October. “I love being in a league that has such great competition. At the end of the day, our goal, one of them, is obviously to get into March Madness and to play in the NCAA Tournament amongst others, but having those kind of opportunities each and every night makes that goal a little bit more attainable for most of us.”

The schedule will get harder after this point as conference play heats up. But all those non-conference games have set up the play style Chris Jans wants for his Bulldogs and it’s not going to focus on one, defense or offense. And whatever the SEC throws their way, Mississippi will be ready.

“Musical chairs is going to be played and you don’t wanna be the one standing when the music stops,” Chris Jans said.