Hey, he's beaten ranked opponents 7 times. 7. That's really impressive.
Don't worry about what that 34 next to the 7 means.
Don't mention the fact that he was at Mississippi State, in arguably the toughest division in college football over the last ten years.
"We are who our record says we are"
Bill Parcells
Sure, he was in a tough division. But that's still about a 17% win rate. That's not good no matter how you try to take up for it.
I just waded through his time at State via Wikipedia, taking notes on his ranked wins. Please note that these are the rankings of their opponents at the time of the game, NOT end-of-year rankings.
2009: They beat 25th ranked Ole Miss, who finished with a 9-4 record. (They lost to the 7th, 25th, 1st, and 2nd ranked teams in other match-ups that year)
2010: 22nd Florida (finished 8-5); Lost to 21st, 15th, 11th, and 13th ranked teams in other match-ups that year.
2011: No ranked wins; Lost to 3rd, 15th, 4th, and 6th ranked teams in other match-ups that year.
2012: No ranked wins; Lost to 1st, 16th, and 5th ranked teams in other match-ups that year.
2013: No ranked wins; Lost to 13th, 10th, 14th, 11th and 1st ranked teams in other match-ups that year.
2014: They beat 8th LSU, 6th A&M, and 2nd Auburn, all of whom finished with an 8-5 overall record. This was their ascent to #1 for a few weeks... until they lost to the 5th, 18th, and 10th ranked teams as part of their downfall.
2015: No ranked wins; Lost to 14th, 14th, 3rd and 19th ranked teams in other match-ups that year.
2016: Beat 7th ranked Texas A&M, who finished with an 8-5 record. Lost to 20th and 1st ranked teams in other match-ups.
2017: Beat 12th ranked LSU (who finished 9-4) and lost to 12th, 13th, and 1st ranked other teams.
Doing the math, the average end-of-year record of the ranked teams they beat: 8.29 - 4.71
Record against gametime rankings 21-25th: 2-2
Record against gametime rankings 16-20th: 0-3
Record against gametime rankings 11-15th: 1-11
Record against gametime rankings 6-10th: 3-4
Record against gametime rankings 1-5th: 1-11
Bless, that 2014 year was some fools gold if I've ever seen it.