First off excited time for both basketball teams to make the tournament and it's never been done here. 20 plus wins and excited to see great coaching and excited for our university this time of year. Best of luck to those teams and players and coaches. Should be exciting to watch. First day a lot of moving parts like most of the country in this era of college football. A lot of film and rotations to watch. Good to be out there and get work in. Have a lot of challenges ahead of us. Lot of starters at new places and figure out the roster and a revolving schedule with more free agency coming up. Trying to make best of it get better with the days coming up.
I think we try to go into a lot right away and learn as much as possible. Get them to spend a lot of time with each other. Lot of team activities and speakers and culture talk. Have to have a meeting immediately when you get somewhere to start that approach and this is like that every year because you have so many players who think a certain way because they've been a certain way at different schools.
Austin has done a good job spending time with players. Throws extra with them. He has a hard act to follow. He doesn't need to be Dart because everyone is different but good for him to learn from that and see how Jaxson took the whole team in and Austin can learn from that and be himself.
Secondary is a work in progress with new pieces and not fully healthy. Spring will be good for that and depending how evaluations go, we may have to look other places for help there.
These practices are for figuring out where we need to add players. Didn't used to be but is now. We have these practices and then free agency and depends how people perform and do we bring in other people or will they even be here. I hate how that sounds but is what it is. They get paid and benefit and nothing college about it, but you can get cut, too. Every benefit has a cost, too.
Caden Lee has done a good job being a leader. Tyler Banks has helped guys that are in transition. Good to see. Still a lot of work for that also.
Very competitive in the backfield and that's good. Have to perform better than last year. Self scout in the offseason that was an area of concern with how we performed -- especially later in the year.
Body type wise the receivers are a good looking group with length and movement. We lost a lot of players at spots so excited to see the receivers who came in and we think we have a really good shot. Work to do to develop and work with Simmons, but it's a good group.
(Dumb question about if field storming fines will affect recruiting) Lane said no.
I'm not going to get into the positions publicly that we know and think we need to get help from the portal. I appreciate how hard the guys work out there.
Lacy is a high-end player who has a good ceiling because of his size-speed and how he moves can be really elite. That's huge to have. He has a chance to be great, and you can only make guys so much faster and bigger, but I'm excited he got here the second time around.
Hard to duplicate the DL stats from last year, but it's a good room with a lot of potential. We really like what's there.
It's always challenging to know for sure what you're getting with mentality and culture with a player. The NFL screws it up some and they get more opportunities to spend time with the guys. We're constantly trying to get that info and make the best decisions for who we bring in here.
We like the tight end room with that competition. Wright was great when he was healthy and Luke has done a good job at Arkansas for two years no. It's good to have him. That's a great situation with those two.
Our incoming ends have high ceilings and length to have the ability to rush and stop the run. We lost so much at defensive end we had to have guys there. Inside we lost elite players, but we've been developing that room and feel good about it. We did it the old school way. We have guys in the program who in multiple years have come on and are ready.
The NFL class from Ole Miss this year is a good class with a lot of good kids and played some dominant football despite it not ending like we wanted it to go. They won 10 games all by double digits and we lost all our one-score games. Analytically we did a good job and they are good players. It was a lot of work to put those guys together on that team. I hope things go great for them in the Draft and the opportunity that comes next.
Very concerned about all the experience loss especially at quarterback. It's been a concern since the last game. But we are signing guys and bringing people to help that. Guys who have been at other places.
I think we try to go into a lot right away and learn as much as possible. Get them to spend a lot of time with each other. Lot of team activities and speakers and culture talk. Have to have a meeting immediately when you get somewhere to start that approach and this is like that every year because you have so many players who think a certain way because they've been a certain way at different schools.
Austin has done a good job spending time with players. Throws extra with them. He has a hard act to follow. He doesn't need to be Dart because everyone is different but good for him to learn from that and see how Jaxson took the whole team in and Austin can learn from that and be himself.
Secondary is a work in progress with new pieces and not fully healthy. Spring will be good for that and depending how evaluations go, we may have to look other places for help there.
These practices are for figuring out where we need to add players. Didn't used to be but is now. We have these practices and then free agency and depends how people perform and do we bring in other people or will they even be here. I hate how that sounds but is what it is. They get paid and benefit and nothing college about it, but you can get cut, too. Every benefit has a cost, too.
Caden Lee has done a good job being a leader. Tyler Banks has helped guys that are in transition. Good to see. Still a lot of work for that also.
Very competitive in the backfield and that's good. Have to perform better than last year. Self scout in the offseason that was an area of concern with how we performed -- especially later in the year.
Body type wise the receivers are a good looking group with length and movement. We lost a lot of players at spots so excited to see the receivers who came in and we think we have a really good shot. Work to do to develop and work with Simmons, but it's a good group.
(Dumb question about if field storming fines will affect recruiting) Lane said no.
I'm not going to get into the positions publicly that we know and think we need to get help from the portal. I appreciate how hard the guys work out there.
Lacy is a high-end player who has a good ceiling because of his size-speed and how he moves can be really elite. That's huge to have. He has a chance to be great, and you can only make guys so much faster and bigger, but I'm excited he got here the second time around.
Hard to duplicate the DL stats from last year, but it's a good room with a lot of potential. We really like what's there.
It's always challenging to know for sure what you're getting with mentality and culture with a player. The NFL screws it up some and they get more opportunities to spend time with the guys. We're constantly trying to get that info and make the best decisions for who we bring in here.
We like the tight end room with that competition. Wright was great when he was healthy and Luke has done a good job at Arkansas for two years no. It's good to have him. That's a great situation with those two.
Our incoming ends have high ceilings and length to have the ability to rush and stop the run. We lost so much at defensive end we had to have guys there. Inside we lost elite players, but we've been developing that room and feel good about it. We did it the old school way. We have guys in the program who in multiple years have come on and are ready.
The NFL class from Ole Miss this year is a good class with a lot of good kids and played some dominant football despite it not ending like we wanted it to go. They won 10 games all by double digits and we lost all our one-score games. Analytically we did a good job and they are good players. It was a lot of work to put those guys together on that team. I hope things go great for them in the Draft and the opportunity that comes next.
Very concerned about all the experience loss especially at quarterback. It's been a concern since the last game. But we are signing guys and bringing people to help that. Guys who have been at other places.
