Finley on Football: Ole Miss safety AJ Finley looks for Rebs’ defense to continue working, improving
Editor’s Note: The Rebel Walk is excited and proud to present “Finley on Football.” We’ll visit each week with Ole Miss standout safety AJ Finley, with whom we have an NIL agreement, and get his thoughts on Rebel football. Hotty Toddy!
OXFORD, Miss. – A.J. Finley and the Ole Miss defense played well in the season-opening 28-10 win over Troy. The Trojans were limited to only 60 yards rushing and did not find the end zone until midway through the fourth quarter.
A lot of teams would rest on their laurels after that performance. But not the Ole Miss defense.
With Central Arkansas coming to Vaught-Hemingway today, Finley and the Rebels did not sleep on their FCS opponent this week.
“I think we played a pretty good game on defense (against Troy),” Finley told The Rebel Walk earlier this week.
“But I think one of the things we can improve on is just keep doing the little things right because you know, honestly, they shouldn’t have scored a touchdown or a field goal. So, keep doing the little things right and hopefully get some shutouts and play better defense.”
Ole Miss safety AJ Finley
Finley had a solid game in the opener, collecting five tackles — all of them solo stops. But he also was impressed by the performance of a few newcomers, especially in the linebacking corps. TCU transfer Khari Coleman had five tackles for loss and a pair of sacks while Troy Brown, a transfer from Central Michigan, had 11 tackles.
“I mean, I never doubted those guys,” Finley said.
“When they first got here, I knew they were going to be some immediate impact players. So, nothing really that they did on Saturday shocked me. I knew what they had, so I knew what they were going to do.”
AJ Finley
What made the transfers’ performance even more impressive is the way they showed leadership after the departure of last year’s linebackers Mark Robinson and Chance Campbell who are both in the NFL now.
“With Mark and Chance, those guys leaving, (the newcomers had to step up),” Finley said. “Those were the really the heart of our defense last year. And so them having to come in and replace those guys, I feel like that is hard shoes to fill, but I feel like they’ve done a good job so far through one game.”
There was another newcomer that had to step up as well. Well, sort of a newcomer. Co-defensive coordinator Chris Partridge did well his first game of calling the defense in a game for the Rebels. Finley said the unit did not miss a beat from last season.
“I mean, I wouldn’t say we really did much differently,” Finley said.
“I thought we kept the play sheet really, really basic for this game since it was like not a huge game. So, I think we ran a lot of basic things, which is a lot of the stuff we ran last year. So nothing really was that much different. But I felt we played fast, played physical, that’s the biggest thing we’ve been trying to do coming into this season.”
AJ Finley on the defense vs. Troy
With Ole Miss a solid favorite against the Bears, one of the biggest focal points will be how the Rebels clean up the small mistakes they made last week. But there is one aspect of the season opener Finley would like to see repeated – the atmosphere.
“It honestly surprised me (last week),” Finley said. “When we got to the walk of champions, there was actually more people than I thought would be there. So, for a non-conference game and the first game of the season, it was pretty packed.”
Ole Miss and the Bears kickoff at 6 p.m. today, September 10, at Vaught-Hemingway.
(Feature image credit: Josh McCoy, Ole Miss)
Steve Barnes
Steve Barnes joins The Rebel Walk staff as a senior writer and brings a trifecta of journalistic experience. As a writer, he has covered college sports for Rivals.com, Football.com and SaturdayDownSouth.com as well as served as a beat writer for various traditional newspapers.
He has been a broadcaster for arena football and several national tournament events for the National Junior College Athletic Association as well as hosting various shows on radio.
A former sports information director at Albany (Ga.) State University and an assistant at Troy and West Florida, he has helped host many NCAA conference, regional and national events, including serving five years on the media committee of the NCAA Division II World Series.
Barnes, a native of Pensacola, Fla., attended Ole Miss in 1983-84, where his first journalism teacher was David Kellum. The duo has come a long way since that time.
He will bring a proven journalistic track record, along with a knack for finding the out-of-the-ordinary story angles to The Rebel Walk.
Barnes continues to reside in Pensacola a mere ten minutes from the beach because he does have taste and a brain.
