Prayers for Coach McCray-Penson and her family. A terrible turn of events - I had thought that Miss State and Penson was set up for a bit of a rebound to a better season this coming season. Last season was a pretty rough start for Nikki - the fanbase was in shock from Schaefer leaving and only a hire of the level of an existing head coach who is either a national title winner or a contender for one for several seasons was going to make the Bulldog fanbase happy about things.
Then the pandemic sort of stunted Nikki and staff's good chance to get the team on the same page and prepared for the SEC schedule. I felt that this season was going to show a substantial rebound forward, and it still may happen even in McCray-Penson's absence - which will only fuel the fires of the Bulldog Nation that Nikki was not a good coach, if it happens. They'll all say that the rebound will be because she's not on the sideline now - if it doesn't happen, they'll blame what she's done in the 1.5 years' time as their HC.
Meanwhile, while I have faith that Nikki will beat this thing down once again, this is only a major blow to her head-coaching career developing. It's a crying shame....