SPRINGTIME SHOWS
Three questions for Ole Miss before 2024 Grove Bowl Games
OXFORD — The Ole Miss football spring game comes with a twist in 2024 – it’s not actually a game.
Instead, Rebels coach Lane Kiffin has opted to transform the Grove Bowl into the Grove Bowl Games, which will include seven-on-seven action and some skills competition fun.
Undoubtedly, though, it will make for a different viewing experience than the more traditional format we’re used to. What can we learn when the Rebels take the field at Vaught-hemingway Stadium on Saturday (3 p.m., SEC Network+)?
Do Ole Miss football’s reserve quarterbacks pass the eye test?
Quarterback competitions dominated the list of storylines for the past two
Grove Bowl events. There will be no such intrigue in 2024 – Jaxson Dart is the guy.
Still, Ole Miss’ quarterback room will be under the microscope, mostly because the names behind Dart remain a bit of a mystery to those who aren’t inside the Manning Center regularly.
Walker Howard played 14 total snaps for the Rebels last season, and 13 of them came in the first week of the season against a hapless Mercer FCS defense. How has he progressed? Can he be relied upon to step in if Dart gets injured? Should he be considered the starter in waiting if and when Dart moves on following the season?
Some seven-on-seven reps won’t answer those questions, but they might help us start to form an educated guess.
Similarly, Ole Miss fans have heard the hype about Austin Simmons and his rocket arm, but they haven’t seen it on the field – though he looks special on the baseball diamond. Early enrollee AJ
Maddox could get some time, too.
The nature of seven-on-seven football will highlight the individual matchups between Ole Miss’ wide receivers and its defensive backs, and that’s an exciting proposition.
Ole Miss’ group of wideouts – when at full strength – is among the best in the country. It’s unclear exactly which receivers will be healthy enough to partake in Saturday’s festivities, but whatever new position coach George Mcdonald’s unit can muster should be enough to give the Rebels’ new pieces in the secondary an interesting test.
The Rebels are going to be relying on veteran SEC transfer corners Trey Amos and Brandon Turnage as coordi
nator Pete Golding looks to level up his unit that progressed in 2023 but struggled against the best teams on Ole Miss’ schedule.
The spring ball battles between Amos and star receiver Tre Harris already have raised eyebrows.
“It’s always a good thing to go against one of the best,” Amos said last week. “We’re always going at it and we always wanna make each other better.”
What does Lane Kiffin have up his sleeve?
The choice not to play a traditional spring game was a calculated one by Kiffin, who continues to prove himself willing to change.
Still, there will be recruits on campus. With the transfer portal opening two days later, there could be prospective additions watching along from afar.
Kiffin, ever the showman, will be aware of this.
So how does he make this fun? How does he make the alternative format engaging for the fans in attendance?
It might sound trivial. But vibes matter. Few coaches understand that better than Kiffin.
David Eckert covers Ole Miss for the Clarion Ledger. Email him at deckert@gannett.com or reach him on Twitter @davideckert98.