With Paul Finebaum and the “SEC Nation” crew in Starkville, Mississippi State coach Joe Moorhead visited the set of “The Paul Finebaum Show” for an interview with the host on Friday’s show. When Rutgers rumors came up, Moorhead gave an answer that got a cheer from the Bulldogs fans on hand, but Finebaum interpreted it differently.

After discussing a variety of other topics about Mississippi State football and the MSU-LSU game, Finebaum brought up the report that Moorhead has emerged as a top candidate for the Rutgers job. He asked what Moorhead had to say about the report.

“I would say this, my entire focus is on what we need to do to be successful and compete against a very good LSU team and what we need to do to be able to turn this into a championship-level program,” Moorhead said.

Finebaum wasn’t satisfied with the answer, calling it coachspeak. He brought up Moorhead’s daughter being brought to tears by fans yelling at Moorhead as one reason why people wouldn’t be surprised if the second-year Bulldogs coach considered leaving to take the Rutgers job.

“No, it’s not something that’s under consideration,” Moorhead replied. “My focus is here at Mississippi State. This is where we want to be. This is what we’re going to do.”

That answer got cheers from the fans behind the set. Finebaum, however, kept pressing. He asked, “So if your representatives got a call from Rutgers..”

“If they get a call, then we’ll deal with it then,” Moorhead said.

Finebaum followed up again, “So you would consider it?”

“No – I’m not saying I would consider it. But like I said, my focus is here on Mississippi State,” Moorhead said.

The interview wrapped up soon after, with Finebaum acknowledging he would also be focused on facing LSU if he were in Moorhead’s situation.

Later in the show, Finebaum brought up the interview again, telling the viewers he wanted to “recap” it since the show went to commercial after the interview concluded. Finebaum called the Rutgers discussion “extremely strange” from his standpoint and noted, “I didn’t hear a denial there.”