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The University of Mississippi Athletics
Spring Update 04.09: Rebels Wrap Up Grove Bowl Preparations
4/9/2015 | Football
by Austin Miller, OleMissSports.com
OXFORD, Miss. -- Ole Miss practiced in full pads for two hours on Wednesday, their last work in full pads before the annual Regions Bank Grove Bowl on Saturday. The Rebels will work without pads on Thursday and then divide into teams for Saturday.
The Grove Bowl, scheduled for noon, will be broadcast live on SEC Network+, and it will later be broadcast on the SEC Network on Sunday at 5:30 p.m. With that in mind, everyone can see the spring football games now, so head coach Hugh Freeze said the play calling will be pretty vanilla on both sides of the ball.
"I want a competitive game and I want our kids to have great energy and have fun and our fans to enjoy that," Freeze said. "When you divide it up, when you're short-handed at spots, I don't know what it's going to look like. I really don't. But that's what the kids want to do and I get tweeted all the time and emailed with people saying they want to see a Red-Blue game.
"I wish we had a team coming in here. I'd be real excited about that, to line up and scrimmage another team, but we're going to try to divide it up. If we lose somebody between now and then, we'll have to scrap that plan and just go offense versus defense."
Nearing the end of his fourth spring practice, Freeze reflected on his program's success through the first three years of their journey and looked ahead to what he hopes is his full complement of players for summer workouts and fall practice, bolstered by the return of injured players and the addition of members from their third straight top-15 recruiting class.
"Moving forward in Year Four, to make sure we're successful in people's eyes, we continue to stress to our kids and tell them that they're a good football team," Freeze said. "Our theme this year has been 'chasing greatness,' and we have shown them what that means and what it looks like, not only in football, but also academically, athletically, socially and spiritually, if that's a part of what they want to be.
"As we chase that greatness, we want to be the best team that we can be. If we stay healthy and all of those factors that we can't control, I don't hesitate to say we should be competitive in the SEC West. This league is so difficult that it's hard to say you will win on the scoreboard, but I am excited and I think we have a chance to be a really good football team."
One of the areas where Freeze has been most pleased this spring has been in the running game, including their play in the last full-pad practice of the spring. Despite their many injuries along the offensive line, they moved the ball into the red zone on all four drives during the only live portion of practice, scoring a touchdown and kicking two field goals.
"We have made progress, particularly with running the football this spring, even though we had most of our linemen sidelined due to injury," Freeze said. "I'm excited about what we have accomplished. We have a long way to go, as everyone does, but we made the most of the practices we were afforded."
When asked who has been the biggest surprise of spring practice, the first name that came to his mind was junior Derrick Jones, who has settled in at wide receiver after splitting time between wide receiver and cornerback during his first two seasons.
Freeze also mentioned sophomore safety C.J. Hampton, junior defensive tackle D.J. Jones, redshirt freshman offensive lineman Jordan Sims and freshman offensive lineman Javon Patterson as players who have impressed him this spring.
Along with the offensive line, the wide receiver corps has also been hit hard by injuries this spring. However, ahead of the Grove Bowl on Saturday, the group is nearly back to full strength.
The trio of junior Quincy Adeboyejo, senior Cody Core and sophomore Markell Pack have all returned from their respective injuries, while junior Laquon Treadwell continues to improve and work toward getting back to 100 percent. Still, Treadwell is the leader of the group.
"Laquon's a great leader in the room for us," sophomore wide receiver Damore'ea Stringfellow said. "He's been there. He knows what he's doing, so he puts us on the right path."
Despite suffering a freak injury during a blocking drill that forced him to miss many of the spring practices, Pack's first spring with the team has been beneficial, particularly coming a freshman season that saw him take on an increased role toward the end of the season.
"I feel like I have gotten much better," Pack said. "I'm more comfortable in this offense. At first, the pace really got me because I was still learning the signals and everything. I had to slow it down. Now, I'm really comfortable."
Overall, whether it's the emergence of one player, or the return to health of another player, the collection of talent in the wide receiver room has pushed each player to make the most of their opportunities this spring.
"It's great competition," Stringfellow said. "It's a room full of great receivers. Every day, we push each other to get better. We get on each other when we make mistakes. It's a great room, and I look forward to seeing what we have."
"Our coach (Grant Heard) tells us how great we can be all the time," added Pack. "We're just working to get there."
Austin Miller is a writer and blogger for OleMissSports.com. He joined the staff in June 2013 after serving as sports editor of the Daily Mississippian. Follow him on Twitter @austinkmiller.
