DALLAS ― The Ole Miss football representatives at 2024 SEC Media Days spent their Monday dodging “rat poison,” more potent and in higher quantity than quarterback Jaxson Dart has seen in his time with the Rebels.
The “rat poison” phrase was coined by legendary Alabama coach Nick Saban and adopted by Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin, who spent three years on Saban’s staff. It’s a catch-all term to describe outside noise ‒ particularly of the positive variety.
“This is a ‘rat poison’ situation here to have all this attention on our players,” Kiffin said. “And it means nothing because it’s all about the work that they put in, the process they do daily. They’re working extremely hard this summer, and then we’re going to have a lot of work to do in training camp.”
The paradigm has shifted on Ole Miss, which returned several key members of last year’s 11-2 team and brought in college football’s top-ranked transfer class.
Ole Miss won’t sneak up on anybody in 2024. The Rebels will begin the season with a seat at the SEC’s proverbial adult table and spend 12 regular-season games fighting to keep it.
It’s a new challenge, one that comes with brighter lights and heavier expectations ‒ and plenty of reporters asking these Rebels about how great they’re going to be.
“I think it’s fun,” Dart said. “We’ve set that expectation up for ourselves. That’s what happens when you win and you have success. But I don’t think from a standpoint of us falling into those (traps) ‒ we compete every single day. And we have a bunch of mature guys who have been in situations like this.”
Within the Rebels’ program, Kiffin ranks among the figures most prepared to deal with what Ole Miss experienced Monday ‒ and will continue to experience before the season kicks off on Aug. 31.
Under Kiffin, Southern Cal entered the 2012 season as the AP’s top-ranked…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/why-season-ole-miss-football-000457860.html
Author : The Clarion Ledger
Publish date : 2024-07-16 00:04:57
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