Hugh Freeze and D.J. Jones during Tuesday practice. (PHOTO BY: ARIEL COBBERT)
For the last two seasons, Ole Miss has faced Vanderbilt and Boise State in the season opener, but this year the schedule features a much different opponent.
Head coach Hugh Freeze said facing UT-Martin in the 2015 opener has made him more tense than in years past.
“I’m more anxious. You know what people’s perception is of what this Saturday should be. You’re never quite sure what your team is going to do in that opening day,” Freeze said. “We have new quarterbacks, so I’m probably more uptight about this one.”
Freeze spoke well of Skyhawks head coach Jason Simpson.
“Jason does a great job there, and they play tough against SEC opponents, so I’m probably more uptight,” Freeze said. “I would rather open like we have the last few games and have our FCS opponent down the schedule a bit, but this was done long before I got here. We have to do it and this is my job to get them ready and I’ve got to do that.”
The quarterback position still remains the biggest mystery for Ole Miss heading into Saturday’s game. Despite what some media outlets reported, Freeze was adamant that the starter had not yet been chosen and the three-man competition is still ongoing.
“Today would be a different starter than what I thought yesterday, I think that’s a good thing. It wasn’t that the other played quite as bad. Just had a few inaccurate throws and the other guy threw it really well,” Freeze said. “I expect all three to get snaps and ultimately who’s going to be the quarterback is going to be decided by what they do on Saturdays.”
Freeze said junior college transfer Chad Kelly was leading over sophomores DeVante Kincade and Ryan Buchanan on Monday, but he is still weighing his options before the Tennessee-Martin game.
“I’ll go talk with the staff after tomorrow and I’ll go make a final decision. I said as of today, Chad (Kelly) is taking the snaps with the ones and if this week continues that way, he’ll do that on Saturday,” Freeze said. “Was enough done by the end of tomorrow to change that? I don’t know. We’ll decide that tomorrow for sure.”
Freeze said the tight race was between all three quarterbacks and all three earned the right to have a chance at the job.
“I’ve got a package I really like with Kincade, and Ryan (Buchanan) and Chad are kind of in the other mode, so all three can do some good things,” Freeze said.
Freeze said the run game experienced very few negative plays in fall practice and gave some insight into what he wanted from his rushing offense this season.
“I’d love to see a couple of explosive runs, those 20 yarders, that would be really nice, and just run it good enough for us to be balanced. That’s all I’ve ever really wanted,” Freeze said. “I’m not hung up on how many we have to rush for a game, but you have to be effective enough to wear teams have to honor both. It would certainly be a big bonus to us if we can create some explosive runs pretty much every week.”
