No. 9 Ole Miss didn’t expect to sweat too much against Charlotte and, for the most part, the Rebels didn’t.
Ole Miss left Vaught-Hemingway Stadium with a 41-9 win and showed a lot of improvement in areas after last week’s season-opening win against No. 24 Louisville. But coach Pete Golding still sees plenty of areas that can be better.
He talked about some of those things, plus much more in his post-game press conference. Here’s everything Golding said.
Pete Golding, Head Coach
On his overall assessment of the win over Charlotte…
It was good to get back out there. Obviously, it was a pretty tough week on them. We were pretty hard on them. I wanted to see more consistent and cleaner football, and I thought we did that in spurts. In the first half, the offense scored on five of six drives. Obviously, we want those to finish in touchdowns. We only had one punt. Defensively, with Kam and Jaheim’s field-goal block, we kept a goose egg on the board for the first half. I was really disappointed in how we came out in the third quarter. That was something we emphasized at halftime. Coming out of the game last week, there was an opportunity in the fourth quarter when we were up two possessions to really close the door and finish the thing, and we didn’t. We focused on that all week and hit it again at halftime, then came out and they got points on the first drive and we went three-and-out and punted on offense. That was disappointing. I also thought there were some critical penalties that extended drives, and right now we’re not good enough defensively to do that. Then there were some of the eye-control things we really focused on this week. We knew it was going to be a screen, screen-and-go perimeter game, and we have to clean that up before next week. But I’m proud of their effort. I think a lot of guys had different opportunities to get into the game and make a difference. Some guys created a lot of value for themselves, created some confidence for themselves and also created confidence with their teammates. It was good to see some other guys get in there.
On whether he saw defensive improvement from Week 1 to Week 2…
At times. Holding somebody scoreless in the first half is tough against anybody. It’s tough against your scout team. We gave up 12 explosive plays last week for 340 yards. It’s hard to beat anybody that way, and to beat a Top 25 team doing that, you’re flirting with things. I thought we minimized them a little bit. I was super disappointed in the same play recurring. You feel like you get on the sideline and emphasize it after it was something you emphasized all week. The attention to detail, the eye control and the fact that it was multiple people is the problem. We have to learn from other guys’ mistakes. When we see it on tape and correct it, we have to be able to fix it. We’re going to continue rotating guys and continue trying to find five guys in the back end who do shit right because right now we don’t have five.
On Kewan Lacy receiving the majority of the running back work…
I don’t know the exact numbers of the rotation. Obviously, we played at least three guys at the position, but part of it is getting into the flow of the offense. There are so many new guys and it’s still early in the season, so you have to create some continuity within the group. Our goal was to get rolling in the first half and have some decisions to make going into the second half. I thought we were going to be able to do that, and then on the first defensive drive of the second half you let them score some points and now it’s right back to a three-possession game. That didn’t allow us to do some things as early as we would have liked. We have to do a better job against these types of teams early in games to get it into a position where we can roll some other guys. It was good to see Deuce get in there and operate the offense at a normal pace. I think that’s really important to continue developing him. We’re definitely still rolling guys at running back, but we wanted to get No. 5 into the flow of the game and get him rolling so he could be healthy going into conference play.
On the team’s injury situation…
I think we came out pretty clean. I haven’t talked to Pat yet, but nothing felt like an issue during the game.
On the offensive line’s performance…
I didn’t watch the iPad on offense. I was just naturally seeing it while watching the defensive series. Those teams are kind of feast or famine a lot of times. They throw a lot of different looks at you, stunt a lot and bring pressure to create negative-yardage plays. It felt like we were able to run the ball for the most part. I haven’t really looked at the stats yet, but late in the game when they know we’re going to run it, that’s when I want to be able to run the football. That’s what I’ve always said. You have to be able to line up, put your hand in the dirt when they know you’re going to run it and still run the football. I don’t know that we did that, so we have to get to that point. But I thought we moved the football efficiently on offense. With Tommy being out and some other guys getting banged up a little bit, I thought the offensive line did well.
On whether the tackling improved from the Louisville game…
I think at the point of attack it improved a little bit. I still think there were some angle issues that were the same as last week. A couple of those explosive runs were guys overrunning the football, not having gap control and things like that. To the naked eye, at the actual point of contact, I think it was better. I think more guys got to the ball. I still think there’s an angle issue with some of these guys that we have to continue cleaning up. This week, the guy with the ball was different, too. Those things change. Some guys are harder to tackle. We have to continue working on the angles, but there was improvement from some guys who put bad stuff on tape last week. I thought they showed up and made an effort to improve.
On how much the secondary issues are related to Antonio Kite and Sharif Denson being out…
Obviously, those were two starters throughout fall camp, but I’m not going to sit here and use that as an excuse because it can’t be. That’s one reason we went out and got a lot of defensive backs, to create depth. You need rotational pieces. It isn’t an excuse whether you were out there first or second. You have to know where to line up, know who to look at, know your primary key and secondary key, and do your job consistently. It’s definitely not a scapegoat. Does it make a difference? Yeah. Does it create a few more moving parts in the back end? Yeah. Some guys are moving to different spots, and maybe we can’t put these two beside each other and have to put somebody else between them. There’s a lot going on with it, but with this game plan being very, very simple, I was hoping to see a bigger improvement. That’s something we’re going to have to go to work on tonight.
On the potential return of Denson and Kite…
I think Sharif for sure will play this week. We were hopeful he could play at least some in this game, and then a decision was made Wednesday to make sure we had him for next Tuesday. We went ahead and had an injection Wednesday to make sure he would be ready to go for next week. Kite’s situation is hopeful for this week. I don’t think we’ll know until toward the end of the week. Dorian Barney was able to get a lot of reps tonight, which was good. Dante Core got a lot of reps. Both of them needed a lot of reps. They didn’t play perfectly, but it was good to get them back out there. Then we can potentially move some other guys out there if need be.
On the offense’s consistency against Charlotte…
I thought it was really efficient in the first half. When you score on five of six drives, even though they weren’t all touchdowns, I think that’s really efficient. I was disappointed in how we started the second half. Like I said, we came out and went three-and-out offensively, and then defensively gave up points. Right now, on both sides, it isn’t the other side of the football. It’s us. That was the whole focus this week. It isn’t about Charlotte. It isn’t about anybody else. It’s about us. We’re stopping ourselves offensively. Last week, it was turning the football over. This week, it was some drops and missed blocks. Defensively, you get them into some third-and-longs and then have a facemask or roughing the passer. We aren’t good enough to do that. Those are the things you have to clean up on both sides of the football to become consistent.
On Trinidad Chambliss’ command of the offense…
He has everybody’s attention in there. They want the ball in his hands. He makes really good decisions and understands the offense, and JDB and Joe both do a great job with him. My plan going into the second half, until it got back to three possessions, was to let Deuce start the second half. Trinidad came to me pissed off and said, “Coach, man, I’ve got to play. I need to play.” He has that competitive character we’ve always talked about. We’ve got a shot as long as No. 6 has the ball in his hands.
On Chambliss distributing the ball to nine different receivers…
That’s the biggest thing. You can have a plan for guys going into it and say, “Hey, we want to target this guy,” but it’s based on what they’re doing on the other side of the ball. I think we’re doing a really good job right now of taking what people give us while still dialing up some things for Deuce. I thought we had to get Deuce going, and he got going. It’s good to see him with the ball. Caleb Cunningham is big and strong, has long speed and is a really physical presence. Guys are playing soft off him, and that hitch can go 60 yards at any moment because he can break a tackle. It was really good to get Caleb into the game and into the flow because I think he can be a big piece of this offense. It was also good to see Johntay score and have a little juice. Horatio has been Mr. Consistent. I think he shows up every week. I think we missed Caleb Odom a little bit tonight, so getting him back next week and getting healthy will be important. Some of those other guys, Hasz and the rest of them, stepped in. We’re going to have to distribute the football based on how people are playing us, and I think Trinidad did that tonight.
On opening SEC play next week…
I’m super excited for SEC play and to be able to do it at home. The crowd tonight was awesome. It was good to get back in the Vaught and feel that energy. It felt like we picked up right where we left off against Tulane. The fans were great and the students were awesome, so it was good to have that juice. It’s for real now, right? It’s SEC play. Every game counts for two. We’re going to come in, have a really good week and focus on ourselves. We still have a lot to clean up, and we know we’ll have to be at our best.
