To say that Ole Miss will go to war in the trenches short-handed on Saturday could probably best be described as an understatement. The lingering effects of the nightmarish month of October for the Rebels are still being sharply felt. Injuries have decimated the offensive line and left Head Coach Hugh Freeze and the rest of the coaching staff scrambling to find a serviceable line up front.
Freeze was asked on Wednesday about the difficulty in finding bodies to fill the void on Saturday.
“Well, we’ve got five,” he quipped. “The center will be a guy that has never snapped the ball in game play, so that can always be interesting.”
Javon Patterson and Jacob Feeley will handle the snapping duties this weekend in the absence of Robert Conyers and Sean Rawlings, who are both among the host of Rebel offensive linemen hampered by injuries. Freeze said it’s the best plan of attack that the team has without burning valuable redshirts this late in the season with just four games remaining.
It will be a unique task for the defense as it faces its second option offensive attack of the season. Ole Miss shut down Wofford in September in a 38-10 rout. The Terriers mustered 305 yards of offense in the contest.
It will be an entirely different look this weekend, though, according to Freeze. He equated it to the “gun version” of Wofford’s attack, citing that Georgia Southern runs most of its option looks out of a shotgun look.
“The number of different looks that you get that they run option out of and you’ve got to be so sound. You don’t get a lot of reps seeing that, either,” Freeze said.
The revolving door at linebacker keeps rotating as senior transfer Rommel Mageo will get the start at middle linebacker. It’s the latest chapter in Defensive Coordinator Dave Wommack’s quest to find some sort of run stopping answer at linebacker. Opponents have run wild on the Rebels the last three weeks, and they won’t get to shy away from their deficiencies when they take the field against an Eagles offense that is averaging 239 yards per game on the ground.
As the team puts a largely forgetful month of October and trudges forward, Freeze has harped over and over again about the mindset of being 1-0 each week, not letting previous defeats and struggles discourage his group. That mindset will need to be in full force on Saturday as the reality of an 11 a.m. setting against a non-power five opponent looms.
“That’s all they’re going to hear,” Freeze said. “ I can’t say that every single person is as determined as some. Saturday will reveal that for sure, but that is the message and the only message: preparing to be 1-0. You’ve got to find something to motivate yourself that is bigger than a scoreboard or a record. You’ve got to find something.”
