Rebels found offensive groove in win over LSU, look to continue offensive onslaught against Arkansas
OXFORD, Miss. — Last week at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium, Ole Miss needed to score 55 points to escape with a six-point win over LSU. This week, Arkansas comes to Oxford and the last time the Razorbacks were here, Ole Miss needed 52 points to get out of the game with a one-point victory.
Although the offense put up videogame like numbers, Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin believes it took a superior offensive effort to beat the Tigers who, themselves, came in with an elite offense.
“Anytime you have games that are a hundred points, it’s a combination of really good offenses that day and really poor defenses,” Kiffin said. “So, but (LSU) has a lot of NFL players on that offense. I don’t watch everybody in the country, but I would have a hard time imagining there is a better starting 11 than LSU. They’re going to score a lot of points on a lot of people.”
Ole Miss racked up 706 yards in the game, which was the good news. On the flip side, the Rebels surrendered 637, but the defense came up with clutch plays when they were needed.
“It wasn’t pretty, a lot of parts of the game, but they made significant plays,” Coach Kiffin noted.
LSU quarterback Jayden Daniels threw for 414 yards and ran for another 99. Ole Miss was able to bottle the elusive Daniels down the stretch, but will have a much tougher assignment this week with Arkansas’ K.J. Jefferson who stands 6-foot-3 and weighs 247 pounds.
“This is like a defensive lineman playing quarterback,” Kiffin said of the Razorback quarterback. “It’s for real, he’s that big and that hard to bring down. So, this is very challenging and one that we have struggled at so we got a lot of ideas and we’ve got to do them well.”
Still to counter Jefferson, the Ole Miss offense must continue to have the success it had against the Tigers.
Sophomore Quinshon Judkins finally had his coming out party of the season running for 177 yards last week. He has been waiting for a game where the offense finally clicked.
“I think our offense as far as the running game really got rolling this past weekend,” Judkins said. “I was really excited going out, I feel like everybody was prepared with the job that we had to do.”
Ulysses Bentley IV chipped in another 90 yards on the ground — a career high — and quarterback Jaxson Dart ran for 50.
Dart also threw for 389 yards and four touchdowns. Both Tre Harris and Jordan Watkins topped the century mark in receiving, combining for 256 yards.
Ole Miss is fortunate to have found its potent offense last week. If the LSU game and the last time Arkansas visited is any indication, the Rebels will need to light up the scoreboard again.
Kickoff is set for 6:30 p.m. and the game can be seen on the SEC Network.
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.
