Alcorn State’s colors are the time worn purple and gold. This year, however, yellow has seemed to become one of the primary colors.

Alcorn State is the most penalized of the 123 teams in the Football Championship Subdivision. It has been flagged 129 times for 1,246 yards, 12 penalties and more than 100 yards more than runner-up North Carolina Central.

By comparison, Furman is the least penalized team in the FCS with 36.

It hasn’t crippled the Braves. They still have a 7-4 record and won the SWAC’s East Division championship for the fourth year in a row. It is clearly a source of frustration for head coach Fred McNair, however.

“It’s about guys not doing the things that they’re supposed to. We should never be seeing this many chop blocks. We have two weeks to fix it and we will,” McNair said after Alcorn was penalized nine times for 111 yards in a 7-3 loss to Jackson State last week.

Alcorn has had at least 100 yards worth of penalties in six of its 11 games this season — including each of the past three — and at least seven penalties in every game. In the last three games alone it has been penalized 42 times for 443 yards.

By comparison, that’s more penalties FCS leaders Furman and VMI have had all season, and more yards than eight teams.

SWAC leader Texas Southern has been penalized 65 times for 560 yards.

Alcorn has obviously had penalties of all different sorts, but against Jackson State it was the ones in crucial situations that led to defeat.

The Braves had four first downs negated by penalties and ended up punting on each drive. Those calls blunted whatever momentum the offense was generating and kept the team from scoring a touchdown for the first time in more than five years.

Before last week, the last time Alcorn hadn’t reached the end zone was a 56-0 loss to Arkansas State in September 2012.

“Too many penalties, too many penalties, too many penalties. We weren’t able to overcome those against a good defense,” McNair said. “I can’t take any credit away from Jackson State because they played well. They’re a very aggressive team. Though, it just comes back to penalties and our guys have to realize those types of mistakes won’t beat anyone. A lot of those penalties were selfish penalties.”