Ole Miss is a quarter of the way through its season and on a bye week.
After four games, we’re starting to have good ideas about how teams stack up against one another, what they do well and what they don’t do well.
For Ole Miss, the latter of those is obvious and will certainly be a focal point this week.
The Rebels’ run defense is bad. Really bad.
Its struggles were on full display Saturday in Gainesville as Florida gashed its way to 305 rushing yards and 5.7 yards per carry.
“That’s inexcusable,” Ole Miss’ leading tackler this season, Keaton Thomas, said after Saturday’s game. “We have to fix that.”
But the struggles have shown up in every game this season. Louisville had 162 rushing yards and a 4.2 ypc. LSU had 172 and a 4.0 ypc. Even Charlotte ran the ball well, running 33 times for 143 yards (4.3 ypc).
That’s an average of 194.8 rushing yards per game allowed by Ole Miss and ranks No. 126 out of 138 FBS teams. It also ranks dead last in the SEC in yards per game and yards per attempt (4.64). It’s second-to-last in rushing touchdowns (10) allowed with only Arkansas (11) having allowed more.
Compounding the problem is teams are picking up first downs via the run with ease. Ole Miss has given up 42 first downs on run plays.
Missed tackles are playing a major role, too. According to Pro Football Focus, the Rebels have missed 63 tackles in four games. That’s an average of 15.7 missed tackles per game.
That is a major problem that must be solved during this bye week. However, there’s no guarantee the problem will be solved.
“I hope so. With anything, when you’re not very good at it, you have to continue to work at it,” coach Pete Golding said after the 52-28 loss to Florida. “That’s something we’ve emphasized every week. We’ve kind of reset how we drill it and how we structure it. We go live on Tuesdays against the scout team, but it’s continuing to show up. We definitely have to evaluate that this week.”
If the Rebels can’t solve their run defense woes, history doesn’t have many examples that’ll offer them hope. They don’t have to look too far for an example, either.
For the last two seasons, Mississippi State has had one of the worst run defenses in the country.
In 2024, the Bulldogs gave up 216.9 rushing yards per game and 4.98 per carry with 24 rushing touchdowns allowed. Those all ranked last in the SEC and only the touchdowns allowed was in the top 100 nationally.
Last season wasn’t much better. They allowed 186.3 yards per game and 4.87 ypc with 19 touchdowns allowed. The yardage stats both ranked No. 117 nationally and last in the SEC.
And in those two seasons, the Bulldogs won just one SEC game and seven total.
Right now, Ole Miss’ rush defense is playing similarly. The one saving grace for the Rebels is that they have a much better offense than what Mississippi State fielded.
But the point is that a bad run defense doesn’t lead to many wins. If Ole Miss doesn’t get better at stopping the run, a Week 3 win against LSU will end up being the Rebels’ Super Bowl.
