Ole Miss survives in Knoxville, Orgeron out at LSU
Matt Corral's heroic performance, Jake Springer's importance to the defense and a bizarre situation at LSU
Hope everyone is having a good Monday. We have a new, lengthy podcast out with former Ole Miss recruiting specialist Weldon Rotenberg in which we discussed a plethora of subplots from a 31-26 Ole Miss win in Knoxville, the debris throwing saga and Ed Orgeron’s departure from LSU. Check that out here or anywhere you get your podcasts.
We have more to get to today than I could possibly type in a sentence. Buckle up.
Corral wills Rebels to victory in Knoxville
What Matt Corral did on Saturday night is something that I’ll remember for a long time. The best quarterbacks in this sport elevate their team. There are a select few who can will them forward when things crumble around them. It’s rarer than most want to admit and the list of guys that can do it is short. But Corral absolutely did it on Saturday night in Neyland Stadium. He carried the ball 30(!) times and had 200 yards before the final drive knocked him back to 195. He threw for 231 more, and his first interception of the season was a product of risk-taking as he tried to drag the offense past the first down sticks one more time.
It seemed like every single time Ole Miss faced a third down, as the crowd erupted in anticipation of Tennessee finally taking over the game, he converted it to keep Ole Miss from coming unglued. On this night, it was mostly with his legs. A team that entered the night converting 37 percent of its third down attempts went 11-21. By my count, Corral accounted for seven of them — three with his feet.
This is subjective and arguable, but I am not certain Ole Miss wins that game with any other quarterback in the country under center other than Corral. Spare me the Caleb Williams retort. He’s a true freshman with a grand total of one career start under his belt. Corral, once again, played a nearly flawless game, which is exactly what he had to do for Ole Miss to win. He wasn’t shrunken by the stage, the atmosphere and the dysfunction around him, but rather thrived in it. Down four offensive starters, he delivered one of the best performances of the 2021 college football season and Ole Miss is 5-1 as a result. Appreciate him while he is here, because what you are watching each week is uncommon.
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Defense did more that enough
The Ole Miss defense has deservedly been the subject of scrutiny over the last two weeks as Alabama and Arkansas gashed them to the tune of 1,127 yards in eight quarters of football, but this group did more than enough for Ole Miss to win the game on Saturday night.
I’m not sure what more the coaching staff could’ve wanted out of this group. The Rebels got back-to-back stops to begin the game to give the offense a chance to create separation and prevent the crowd from getting into the game. That didn’t end up happening, but the first nine points could hardly be blamed on the defense. The offense allowed a safety and then the ensuing touchdown drive began in plus-territory after the Rebels had to cover a free kick.
I thought the defense’s worst moment of the game was allowing the field goal before halftime when a Tennessee offense that had not had a ton of sustained success to that point took over at its own 16 yard line with 53 seconds left. Tennessee had it on its own 48 with 11 seconds left on that drive and still somehow came away with three points. But other than that, the defense stood tall. If I told you Ole Miss would be up 24-12 at halftime and the offense was going to score seven points in the second half, would have have wagered on Ole Miss winning that game? Yeah, me neither.
Each time Tennessee had a chance to take control of the game in the second half, Ole Miss got a crucial stop. After Tennessee scored 10 straight points without the Corral and the Ole Miss offense taking the field, the Rebels missed a field goal and all of a sudden it was 24-19 and the Volunteers had the football with a chance to take a lead. The defense got a stop via a missed field goal. The offense took over and scored. That was a massive moment in the game. Tennessee scored early in the fourth quarter to make it 31-26. Corral threw pick on the ensuing drive. The Vols took over with great field position and another chance to seize control. The defense got another stop (with the help of a penalty). Then came the 4th and 24 stop in which Tennessee got 23 and 3/4 of it. Then this defense, 77 snaps into the game, was put into a position that it shouldn’t have been in on the final drive, but found a way to get off the field.
It wasn’t perfect. This defense is thin and is littered with flaws, but Saturday showed that the best version of this group gives Ole Miss a chance to win games on the road in the SEC, which is certainly better than what the program has been accustomed to for the last half decade.
Other notes:
Jake Springer is a gigantic difference maker for this team. I think his absence was undervalued to how crucial he is to this Ole Miss defense. I am guilty of that myself. In fairness, we only saw him play in one game before he missed four with an injury. It’s hard to tell how important a player is with a four-quarter sample size, but perhaps the real sample size is the 16 quarters Ole Miss played without Springer compared to the eight the Rebels have played with him on the field. He was everywhere, disruptive at the line of scrimmage and a lift to a previously stagnant pass rush. Springer finished with 11 tackles, seven solo tackles and a sack.
Last week I hypothesized that maybe Springer’s would return and presence on the back end would make D.J. Durkin a little more comfortable letting it fly with blitzes. I guess I was half right? Durkin was absolutely more aggressive in blitzing, but it was Springer doing the blitzing on a number of occasions. If you happen to go back and watch that game, watch how quickly he gets to the line of scrimmage, from how far back he’s aligned before the snap, once he detects a running play. It’s remarkable. While there is a little bit left to be desired with Springer in pass coverage at times, his instincts are remarkable. I don’t think it is crazy to say, even after just one game back, that Springer might be the most important player on the field for this defense. Even if the Rebels have a regression on defense a some point in the next couple weeks, they simply looked different with Springer out there.
Mark Robinson had a monster game. He had 12 solo tackles, 14 total tackles, two sacks and five tackles for loss. I am not smart enough to tell you why Robinson was ‘unlocked,’ if you will, in this game, but I do wonder if it had anything to do with the more aggressive game plan and letting him fly up to the line of scrimmage and blitz more often. Ole Miss brought more than three on a more consistent basis than it has all year and I don’t think it’s an accident Robinson shined as a result. While there are skillset limitations with Robinson, he seems like he has pretty good instincts as well.
The defensive front was better against the run. Tennessee ran for 222 yards, but it took the Vols 50 attempts to do so. That’s what Josh Heupel’s offense does — it runs the ball. And while the Rebels were hardly the 85 Bears against the ground game, 4.4 yards per carry, and fewer explosive plays made Tennessee methodically move the ball down the field. It forced more third and long situations and you saw that the coaching staff did not trust Hendon Hooker to convert throwing the football. That’s a winning recipe against a team with a limited quarterback and Ole Miss was finally good enough against the run to successfully execute it.
This was huge win for a team that is now 5-1 and still has everything to play for. It also felt like the Rebels simply survived Knoxville. If that game went on for 10 more minutes, I am not sure if Ole Miss comes out with a win given the injuries, Corral exiting the game and the defense’s collective snap count adding up. But Ole Miss survived, which will be a theme this month. A roster that already lacked depth is banged up and the road gets no easier with LSU and a road trip at Auburn to close out the month. Ole Miss survived and will need to continue to do that over the next couple weeks as it, presumably, gets healthier.
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Ugly scene unfolds in game’s waning moments
Lane Kiffin was hit with a yellow golf ball. Someone threw a bottle of mustard. An ugly scene unfolded in on Saturday night after the officiating crew upheld the ruling of the receiver being short of the line to gain on the 4th and 24 play. Fans heaved bottles and other debris onto the field and he game stopped for nearly 20 minutes of real time. These are the moments that bring out the worst collective takes among media people and fans alike.
Of course it’s a bad thing that fans were throwing things onto the playing field. It’s a safety issue for the coaches and players. It’s an indictment on everyone involved over a silly game. But’s not some sort of noble stance to take to tweet out your scolding of Tennessee fans as if the entire stadium participated in a full-on riot. The collective urge of people to let it be known that they’re against throwing things onto the field is sort of hilarious to me. Would you like to disavow The Taliban or cancer while you are at it? Everyone was wondering how you, yes, you, felt about those two things and your silence speaks volumes. The collective scolding Tennessee fans got was almost as bizarre as fanboy media members somewhat justifying it or thinking context needs to be added.
Ah, yes, it needs to be said the drunk people heaving mustard bottles onto the field are actually frustrated, not to be mistaken for all of the times fans throw bottles onto the field in sheer elation and happiness. The entire reaction to all of this is bizarre.
It’s a bad scene. People that drank all day and continued to drink throughout a four hour game didn’t make sound decisions. What a revelation. It’s bad. It’s also not unique to Tennessee. Your school has likely done it at some point, and guess what, it is going to happen again. It’s a byproduct of cramming 102,000 people into one place to watch something they’re emotionally invested in. That’s not an excuse. I just don’t understand the collective surprise that it happened and I find the idea that this is unique to one fan base to be stupid.
Ole Miss escaped with a win, no one got injured during the ordeal and Lane Kiffin has one less golf ball to buy. Here’s to hoping it never happens again and people behave decently going forward. I don’t like the odds.
Orgeron out at LSU
Weldon and I paused our Sunday marathon of a podcast to watch the press conference with Ed Orgeron and LSU athletic director Scott Woodward. I found this story to be bizarre when the news broke and was even more perplexed after watching the presser. LSU reached an agreement with Ed Orgeron in which he will not return as head coach in 2022, but will coach the remainder of the season and be awarded the entirety of his $16.9 million buyout.
For all of the talk about LSU planning behind closed doors to utilize some of its (and Orgeron’s) off-field troubles to fire him for cause and avoid giving him a massive payday, this was a surprisingly tame and amicable split. My best guess is that after the Tigers were throttled at Kentucky last weekend, Woodward met with Orgeron and laid out a plan to avoid an ugly breakup. Simply put, LSU didn’t want Orgeron burning the house down on his way out in pursuit of money he believes to be rightfully his and Orgeron didn’t want what became an untenable situation to turn into a long term mudslinging war and sever any semblance of relationship with a place he clearly cares about. Oh, and above all else, neither side wanted the other to pry open their proverbial closet full of skeletons. I suppose you could call it a win for both sides? Sort of? Ed is very rich. LSU gets to move on and everyone comes out ‘ok,’ which I think is all anyone could ask for in a deteriorating situation that appeared ready to erupt.
My friend Brody Miller wrote a terrific and well-sourced story for The Athletic about the demise of Ed Oreron, the locker room issues, a coaching staff and roster that grew to loathe him.
It also shed light on the struggles in Orgeron’s personal life that seeped into his professional life and ultimately made football less of a priority. Orgeron’s flaws that fueled his flameout at Ole Miss, the very same ones he seemingly overcame to take LSU to the pinnacle of the sport, crept back into his behavior and it eventually led to a shockingly quick fall from grace. I don’t expect many people to feel bad for Orgeron, particularly not Ole Miss fans, but there is an element of sadness to a guy losing his way sparked by elements of his personal life crumbling while he’s simultaneously reaching unprecedented professional success.
I don’t know if we’ve seen the last of Ed Orgeron in college football, but if this is his final chapter, what a bizarre and complex one it is. I will be interested to see how Orgeron is remembered and perceived by LSU and the state of Louisiana as time wears on. There’s a lot to unpack regarding his five-year stint as the most powerful public figure in his home state.
On the horizon:
I’ll have Brody on Wednesday’s podcast to discuss this situation and the outlook heading into Ole Miss’s matchup with the Tigers
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