Road set for Ole Miss’ narrow path
OXFORD - South Carolina coach Frank Martin, who is also Andy Kennedy’s good friend, was disappointed with his team’s effort Saturday night. But he said he was equally as happy for Kennedy. Martin was also frustrated. “I have no idea why no one is even mentioning Ole Miss as a team that has a chance to make the NCAA Tournament. I have no idea,” Martin said. “‘They play in any other league in the country (and) right now they’d be one of those teams spoken about as an NCAA Tournament team.”
While Ole Miss may not be in many NCAA Tournament conversations and its odds are long, it has the chance to play itself into the dance by winning the SEC Tournament.
Kennedy was honest Saturday night and said reality is the current numbers don’t dictate that the Rebels, who own an RPI of 67, are a tournament team. Ole Miss is 2-9 against the RPI’s top 50.
The second of those wins came Saturday night against the Gamecocks, and the other was against Vanderbilt. Ole Miss (19-12, 10-8 SEC) is 5-12 against the top 100. While the Rebels don’t have a terrible loss, they also don’t have a true signature win.
That’s why they’re in the position they are now, essentially needing to win the conference tournament. As the sixth seed, Ole Miss won’t know who its first opponent is until the Auburn/Missouri game is decided on Wednesday.
The Rebels have swept Missouri and have beaten Auburn 10 consecutive times, including twice this season. The latest win featured a 23-point second-half comeback.
“Beating somebody three times in a year is difficult to do. I think we’ve beat Auburn 10 times straight. It’s not easy beating somebody that many times in a row, but we’ll certainly try on Thursday,” Kennedy said. “If you can get one (tournament win), you’d be amazed at how quickly you can build momentum. We’ve got to get healthy, we’ve got to get whole.”
Should Ole Miss win its first game, it would have to face Arkansas, which just beat the Rebels by 18 points a week ago. While they avoided Kentucky and Florida, it’s still not a great matchup.
But to get to where it wants to go, Ole Miss will have to beat some quality opponents along the way.
“I’ve got great memories of Nashville. It wasn’t too long ago we had a magical run,” Kennedy said. “Does this team have one in it? I don’t know. But I do know tonight was a positive step for us and I know we’ll go into Nashville with a lot of momentum.”
It’s the sixth consecutive season Ole Miss has outperformed preseason expectations.
The Rebels were projected to finish ninth in the SEC’s preseason poll. They finished tied for fifth, and slid to sixth for the conference tournament after losing a tiebreaker with Alabama.
Nobody is expecting much from Ole Miss in the SEC Tournament. So this presents another chance for Kennedy and company to outperform those.