First off, how much fun was that? Like
@Chase Parham has said so many times, the build is the most fun part. I think we are in the heart of “the build” right now. In my opinion, we’ll look back at this year as the turning point in our climb up the ladder.
This isn’t a super talented team. It’s a group of role players who won on leadership, culture, attitude, willingness to be coached, and effort. The offense is basically an over achieving OL, a bunch of G5 WRs, a star RB, and a gutty leader of a Qb whose teammates and coaches deeply respect him. The defense is a mish-mash of kids thrown together at the last possible minute who know their roles and do their jobs. It’s remarkable.
In my view, this has been one of the best coaching jobs in the country, and one of the best I’ve ever seen at Ole Miss. Lane, Pete and Charlie absolutely hit it out of the park this season. It gives me so much confidence in what’s going to come under Lane. I think Pete was absolutely the missing piece to the puzzle and if and when the day comes that Lane moves on, you don’t look any further than down the hall and hand the keys over. There’s something real to continuity and culture and Pete’s addition, for whatever reason, helped put it all together here. He’s an elite communicator, teacher and a relentless recruiter. He and Lane together is a real problem for the rest of this league.
The recruiting is about to start really showing and we’re setup to make a real run at the post season in 24. This is the fun part, folks. Enjoy it.
This group is special. It was my first year around a Lane team and they’re different. I have no idea if it was a lightning in a bottle/culture thing, but I’d bet not. I’d bet this is something that will only grow.
I hope everybody had a good Thanksgiving and is looking forward to an awesome bowl season.
Supremely grateful,
Kentucky
