Very few individuals (including this writer) would have ever imagined that the Ole Miss football team would be playing at this level within the Southeastern Conference at this juncture.
Let’s revisit the four years prior to team Freeze arriving. Here’s what 2008-2011 reflected within the league scorecard:
- Total Wins 10
- Total Losses 22
- Winning Percentage .310
- In 2010 to 2011, the Rebs were 1-15.
Fast forward to the four year period of 2012-2015 to date. The Rebs are 15-15, an increase of 19 percentage points! And in the previous two years, the Rebs are are 9-5 in conference play, a winning percentage of .643! These numbers are phenomenal in such a short turnaround. Here’s why.
College football, unlike the pros, is solely dependent upon recruiting high school players for the most part with junior college players and transfers filling in some holes. Typically the high school players are redshirted more often than not which delays their contributions by a year or more for those not getting a chance to play right away.
What Hugh Freeze and his staff have accomplished is the blending in of these new recruits, filtering through the inherited players while at the same time establishing a winning program from year one!
Coach Freeze has not only won immediately (three bowls in three years with a fourth on the way), he has recruited beyond anyone’s comprehension while rebuilding the program.
It’s easy to be a critic when the team does not win each and every game, but it’s much more gratifying to understand how competitive this team truly is and how difficult the competition is.
Before concluding, let’s examine this year’s SEC competition’s composite records:
Alabama 8-1
LSU 7-1
Auburn 5-4
Arkansas 5-4
MSU 7-2
A&M 6-3
Florida 8-1
Vanderbilt 3-6
Total: 49-22 (Winning percentage .690)
There you have it. No one guaranteed a league championship at this point in time, but no one anticipated such a success story either. Winning is awesome, but competing is exciting!
Steve Vassallo is a HottyToddy.com contributor. Steve writes on Ole Miss athletics, Oxford business, politics and other subjects. He is an Ole Miss grad and former radio announcer for the basketball team. Currently, Steve is a highly successful leader in the real estate business who lives in Oxford with his wife Rosie. You can contact Steve at sovassallo@gmail.com or call him at 985-852-7745.
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