LORMAN — On Monday morning, Vicksburg native Jay Hopson went back to work toward Alcorn State’s 2013 football season.

The 4-7 record was a success considering the tough situation Hopson faced when he was hired on May 28 to replace fired coach Melvin Spears. He had to put together an entire staff through June and into early July. Work with his football team was limited until preseason practice started on Aug. 1.

One month later, Hopson and the Braves celebrated their first win, a dramatic 22-21 victory over Grambling State at the Port City Classic in Shreveport. It was a game in which the Braves trailed 21-9 to start the fourth quarter but came back and won.

Comebacks would be a theme in all four of Alcorn’s wins in 2012. The Braves beat Southern University 20-17 after driving 70 yards in the final five minutes. The march included a bold fake punt and conversion on fourth down.

The next week, they upset previously unbeaten Alabama A&M 21-20. Three weeks later, the Braves had their best overall game, beating Texas Southern 34-24 to give them four Southwestern Athletic Conference wins.

The four SWAC wins are the most since 2006, when the Braves had a winning season at 6-5 under then-coach Dr. Johnny Thomas.

Hopson had hoped the Braves could had made it five SWAC wins with a victory over archrival Jackson State on Saturday, but it didn’t happen as the Tigers made use of short fields to score three third-quarter touchdowns and beat the Braves 37-11.

Still, Hopson could offer a wry smile after looking out at what Alcorn State officials said was a home record crowd of 30,000 at Jack Spinks/Mario Casem Stadium.

“What a great environment for a college football game,” Hopson said.

The single-game crowd was more than the combined crowd for all four home games from the 2011 season. Only 500 fans attended Alcorn’s last home game last year, which Dr. M. Christopher Brown II used as the key reason to dismiss Spears after just one season.

Hopson has no such worries. Once the final horn sounded, he was already thinking about next season.

“No doubt, we have quite a few areas to address,” Hopson said. “We have to replace a good bit of our front seven on defense, including three starting linebackers.”

The defense, which had seven starters back, was the team’s strength. They played well enough to keep the Braves in most of their games.

Senior linebacker Robert Gainwell led the Braves with 62 tackles, including 131⁄2 for loss and 31⁄2 sacks. Senior strong safety Brandon Thompson had 49 stops while senior linebackers Tim Carter and Zavier Johnson had 88 combined tackles.

All four of the defensive leaders will have to be replaced.

The better news is on offense. Freshman quarterback John Gibbs progressed steadily once he was given the job after the Arkansas State loss. Gibbs completed nearly 50 percent of his passes for 1,406 yards and eight TDs. He operated behind an offensive line that started two freshmen, two sophomores and one senior.

Freshman center Mike Minton started all 11 games at center for the Braves.

“We had a lot of young guys who gained a lot of experience this year,” Minton said. “We know Coach Hopson is a great coach. It will now be up to us to get the new guys next year to just buy into the system.”

Sophomore wide receiver Tollete George will be the top receiving threat coming back. The Braves lose Terrance Lewis who led the team in all-purpose yards at 82.3 per game which ranked third in the SWAC.

“When people consider we had to learn new coaches, and a new offense, in about a month, you have to be proud of what we did this year,” George said. “Coach Hopson is a real nice coach. He came in and turned this program around. I’m really looking forward to my next two years.”

Hopson was proud too of the progress.

“We did a lot of good things this season,” Hopson said. “But this is just the start of a long journey. We still have so much more to do.”

The biggest task ahead for Hopson will be recruiting and preparing for spring practice. He hopes also to completely implement his system with a full offseason.

“We’ll go after both junior college and high school kids,” Hopson said. “We’ll also have a full spring that will start on April 20. It’s big because we can put in the rest of our system in. I’d say we only got in about 60 percent for this season. Once we get in the full package, we should grow as a team.”