Ole Miss Football 2016 SEC West Prediction: 3rd
With Spring Practice in full swing, I make my annual SEC predictions for the upcoming 2016 football season.
The Ole Miss football team was a Hail Pig Sooey or Hog and Lateral or whatever Arkansas fans ended up calling that play away from being the SEC West Champs and in all likelihood the SEC Champs. The Rebels lose a lot of stars from their 2015 team, so will they step back or will their tremendous recruiting keep the boat steady for Ole Miss football?
| Opponent | Home or Away | Predicted Outcome | Wins | Losses | SEC Wins | SEC Losses |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Florida State Seminoles | Neutral (Orlando) | Loss | 1 | |||
| Wofford Terriers | Home | Win | 1 | |||
| Alabama Crimson Tide | Home | Win | 2 | 1 | ||
| Georgia Bulldpgs | Home | Win | 3 | 2 | ||
| Memphis Tigers | Home | Win | 4 | |||
| Arkansas Razorbacks | Away | Loss | 2 | 1 | ||
| LSU Tigers | Away | Loss | 3 | 2 | ||
| Auburn Tigers | Home | Win | 5 | 3 | ||
| Georgia Southern Eagles | Home | Win | 6 | |||
| Texas A&M Aggies | Away | Loss | 4 | 3 | ||
| Vanderbilt Commodores | Away | Win | 7 | 4 | ||
| Mississippi State Bulldogs | Home | Win | 8 | 5 | ||
| Overall 8-4, SEC 5-3 |
I have a strong suspicion the Ole Miss football team in 2016 will be very similar to the Mississippi State football team in 2015. Here is what I mean by that.
The Rebels lost a lot of key players from an impressive 2015 football season. The offensive line took some big hits and the team lost three players who produced at high levels to the NFL Draft. But they do have the best quarterback in the league returning in Chad Kelly.
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Mississippi State was very similar. We had the best returning starting quarterback in the league, but lost a lot around Dak Prescott. We thought he could propel the Bulldogs to great heights but he simply didn’t have enough around him to do as well as fans had hoped.
Ole Miss football fans will experience a similar phenomenon with their Rebels. They’ll be good, but probably not as good as they think going into the season based on the return of Chad Kelly. There’s about four or five games I could see going either way for the Rebels, but in general, I’m pretty confident in the predicted win/loss totals.
The biggest challenge for the Ole Miss football team will be the schedule. It’s one of the most difficult schedules in the SEC, and that alone could keep them below nine or ten wins in 2016.