The Ole Miss Spirit’s Ben Garrett joined McElroy and Cubelic in the Morning on Wednesday to discuss Ole Miss football’s sky-high expectations entering the 2024-25 season.
The Rebels have won 10 or more games in back-to-back years, as well as appeared in a pair of New Year’s Six bowls in each of the last three. They tallied a program-record 11 wins last season.
Ole Miss, on paper, is a popular preseason pick for the expanded College Football Playoff. On3 national analyst Andy Staples this week released his own 12-team projection.
Included was a first-round matchup between 10-seed Ole Miss and 7-seed Texas, with the winner drawing 2-seed Georgia.
“This is a big year, and everybody knows it,” Garrett said. He was talking with ESPN analysts Greg McElroy and Cole Cubelic. McElroy is a one-time quarterback at Alabama. Cubelic was a center at Auburn.
“Ole Miss has never been truly on the precipice (of a national championship) like this in the modern era. They are one of the better teams, roster-wise, in the country. It’s national championship or bust. Anything less than a College Football Playoff appearance is a failure, for sure.”
The SEC announced kickoff times for the first three weeks of the season last month.
ESPN provided the remaining windows for the other nine games on Tuesday.
“There was nothing that moved me at all from my expectations for Ole Miss in 2024,” Garrett said. “I actually think, if anything, if there were some people on the fence, it adds a little more fuel to the hype train.
“They get their four non-conference games out of the way before September is over. You get two bye weeks in the heart of your expanded SEC schedule. You get two early kicks before the critical early kick with Georgia, which could decide whether or not Ole Miss goes to Atlanta.
“I think 2024, if it wasn’t already viewed from the outside-in as an all-in proposition for Ole Miss, it was certainly reinforced, I think, once the schedule was rolled out officially.”
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