Luke’s Rebels re-brand begins

Coach projecting new image for Ole Miss

ATLANTA – Ole Miss coach Matt Luke greeted defensive lineman Josiah Coatney as they crossed paths for the first time in a couple hours July 17. They were on separate tracks as they were guided between interview rooms and embraced a rare chance to interact outside of an interview setting. “Tough questions?” Luke asked. “Eh, they’ve been alright,” Coatney said.

But flashing lights and the clicks of shutters colored even that brief moment between a coach and his player. They held their handshake a little longer than seemed natural. That was what the job called for.

Matt Luke tackled his first SEC Media Days on July 17 with a smile and a series of uncontroversial talking points. For five hours he moved from one interview to the next, putting a new face on the Ole Miss program.

“I put a lot of pressure on myself to put a product on the field that the Ole Miss fans are proud of,” Luke said, “that they can watch that team and say, ‘You know what, that’s my team.’”

Luke replaced Hugh Freeze on July 20, 2017, a week after Freeze took the podium at the 2017 SEC Media Days. Ole Miss had responded to the NCAA Committee on Infractions’ notice of allegations the previous month, and the case dominated the Ole Miss conversations in Hoover.

“This will be my sixth media day,” Freeze said at the time. “If my memory is right, it will be the fifth time we’re still talking about something other than our team.”

On July 17, Luke did field some questions on the NCAA sanctions: Where was Ole Miss in the appeal process? (He believed the in-person hearing will be this month.) Where do you find motivation when you have a bowl ban? (The Rebels were playing and competing for each other.) Was there a sense of relief when the sanctions came down? (Now that they know what they’re dealing with they can move on.)

But the implication behind each was that he was part of the solution, not a potential contributor to the problem.

Luke and his players arrived in Atlanta on July 16.

Their schedules were so packed with media obligations, they didn’t have time to take in the College Football Hall of Fame, Luke said.

Ole Miss’ picks for student-athlete attendees were consistent with the Rebels’ message.

Ole Miss chose not to bring top-10 NFL draft prospects A.J. Brown and Greg Little.

Instead, they highlighted upperclassman leaders Josiah Coatney and Sean Rawlings, along with quarterback Jordan Ta’amu. Both linemen aren’t regularly in the media spotlight. But they could be counted on to present Ole Miss in a positive, not flashy, light. The implication was effectively the coaching cliché of, “We’re not one or two stars, we’re a team.”

That team, built in Luke’s image, was tasked with changing the narrative about Ole Miss.

“I really see the culture of our team continue to build,” Luke said in his opening comments at the podium in the main media room. “I really feel like all of the experiences these young men have gone through have really brought them together as a team. So I really, really like the culture in our locker room right now.”

He gestured with both hands, beaming out over the rows of reporters lined up in front of him.

As soon as he was done, he was ushered behind the stage and through the back route to the next-door Omni Hotel. Even before entering the multimedia room in the Omni, Luke had lost track of the interviews he had done that morning. “It all kind of runs together,” he said. Luke went from station to station, hitting several of the same talking points in each room.

When talking about his path to becoming head coach, he referenced his father’s Ole Miss football helmet, which sat above the TV in his childhood home. He harped on the importance of Ole Miss continuing to develop its ground game on offense and focusing on stopping the run on the other side of the ball. He deflected questions about how the NCAA sanctions impacted the significance of the Egg Bowl with, “It’s always a huge game, but one that you don’t need any extra motivation for.”

In between rooms, he let his face slack, stealing a couple minutes in which he didn’t have to ooze charisma. Then another reporter would intercept him and he’d pause to give him or her his full attention.

“You’ve got some good color,” said the woman dabbing Luke’s face with makeup to decrease the shine on camera.

It was a common comment throughout the day. Luke had just come back from a vacation to Cabo with his wife late on July 13. One last chance to soak up the off-season before diving into a media frenzy.

Luke’s last interview wrapped up on the power-walk back to his hotel room. He would have to scarf down lunch in order to fly back to Oxford to make it in time for a flight to Jackson. He had to be there the evening of July 17 for a Rebel Road Trip event.

When the recorder clicked off, he flashed a grin just as wide as his smile at the beginning of the day.

“How’d I do?” he said.