First pitch for the 2026 collegiate baseball season is just 10 days away.
Ole Miss will begin its campaign with a three game series against Nevada on February 13 and we have a pretty good idea who will be on the mound for the Rebels then.
Hunter Elliot is returning for one final season in Oxford and is set to be one of the SEC’s best pitchers. In fact, Elliot was projected to be the SEC Pitcher of the Year by D1Baseball’s Kendall Rogers.
My projected award winners for the #SEC:
Player of the Year: Derek Curiel, @LSUbaseball
Pitcher of the Year: Hunter Elliott, @OleMissBSB
Freshman of the Year: Carson Brumbaugh, @RazorbackBSB https://t.co/dK8LfbimqU— Kendall Rogers (@KendallRogers) January 29, 2026
It would be a remarkable end to a remarkable college career for Elliot. He was the Rebels’ co-ace as a true freshman when Ole Miss entered the NCAA Tournament as the last team in and then won a national championship. He earned All-America honors and went 2-0 with 28 strikeouts, allowing just four runs in the postseason.
Elliot missed most of the 2023 season and all of 2024 recovering from Tommy John surgery. He returned last season and quickly established himself as one of the nation’s best pitchers.
He started 16 Friday night games and led Ole Miss with a 2.94 ERA, .197 opponent batting average, 10 wins, 85.2 innings pitched, 102 strikeouts and 13 pickoffs (most in the nation). He was the fifth Rebel all-time to win 10 games and record more than 100 strikeouts.
Rankings Snub
It is worth noting/reminding everyone D1Baseball didn’t even include Ole Miss in its top 25 rankings. Yet, the site’s co-owner projects the Rebels to have the best pitcher.
Why the difference?
It’s not because the Rebels’ lack talent. Elliot is one of the best pitchers in the nation and Ole Miss is the only team to have multiple 20-plus home run hitters last season with catcher Austin Fawley, Judd Utermark and Illinois State transfer Daniel Pacella.
“Preseason rankings are what you did the previous year and what you have coming back,” Ole Miss hitting coach Mike Clement told Ole Miss Spirit when the rankings were released. “We haven’t always been ranked because we had a poor year the previous year or we lost a ton. Neither one of those two things are true this year. That’s where some of the surprise and frustration may come in.”
Ole Miss did lose 11 players to the MLB Draft, including nine pitchers. But there’s enough talent still on the roster.
No, the lack of a top 25 ranking likely comes from the brutal schedule the Rebels have to play. Ole Miss, currently, has nine series against ranked teams.
Ole Miss may not have cracked D1Baseball’s preseason top 25, but nothing about this roster says “middle of the pack.”
With a bona fide ace in Hunter Elliot and one of the most dangerous power-hitting cores in the country, the Rebels aren’t lacking talent. They’re just staring down a gauntlet of a schedule.
If anything, that’s the point. This program has lived in the deep end for years, and Elliot’s return only reinforces that Ole Miss expects to matter again.
Rankings or not, the Rebels are built to prove themselves where it counts.
