Welcome to the latest episode of the Locked on Ole Miss podcast, hosted by Steven Willis! Get ready for an action-packed discussion as we explore the shifting landscape of college football and what it means for the Ole Miss Rebels.
🏈 Pac-12 Conference Realignment: The Pac-12 is shaking things up by expanding to include Mountain West schools, transforming into a "Group of Five" conference. How will this move impact other conferences and schools across the nation?
🏈 Ole Miss vs. Wake Forest Game Preview: With quarterback Hank Bachmeier leading Wake Forest's passing game, can Ole Miss's defense rise to the challenge? We break down the key matchups and strategies that could define this showdown.
🏈 Offensive Strategy for Ole Miss: Will the Rebels focus on establishing the run early, or will Jaxson Dart take to the air more frequently? We analyze the potential game plan and its implications for the team's success.
🏈 Wake Forest's Vulnerabilities: Discover the weaknesses in Wake Forest's secondary and offensive line that Ole Miss might exploit. Could these vulnerabilities be the key to a Rebel victory?
🏈 Defensive Strength of Ole Miss: With a formidable run defense and a knack for tackles for loss, Ole Miss is poised to increase quarterback pressure. How will this defensive prowess play out against Wake Forest?
Join us for this insightful episode and stay ahead of the game with all things Ole Miss Rebels! Don't forget to subscribe, like, and share to keep up with the latest updates and analysis.
Keywords: Ole Miss Rebels, Pac-12 Conference, Mountain West, Hank Bachmeier, Jaxson Dart, Wake Forest, Ole Miss Defense, College Football, SEC Football, Steven Willis, Locked on Ole Miss.
0:00 Ole Miss vs. Wake Forest Game Preview
3:16 Military Conference Realignment
6:13 Hank Bachmeier's Journey and Performance
7:42 Prime-Time Game Strategy
11:05 College Football Dynamics
13:52 Wake Forest's Potential Weaknesses
15:49 Ole Miss Pass Defense Challenges
16:57 Exploring Local Cuisines at Sheetz
Ole Miss football, Wake Forest, Jaxson Dart, Lane Kiffin, SEC, ACC, Hank Bachmeier, Henry Parrish Jr., Walter Nolen, Pete Golding, defensive line, passing game, offensive line, road game, homecoming, CW Network, Power Five, tackles for loss, sacks, RPO, Winston-Salem, Demon Deacons, Rebels, college football
Show originally aired 9/14/24
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Thanks again for making the Lockdown Ole Miss podcast. You first listen every day. We're free and available wherever you get your podcast, including YouTube. We're part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every single day. Hello, I'm Stephen Willis from the Lockdown Ole Miss Podcast. He is Michael Katz from the Northeast Mississippi Tupelo Daily Journal newspaper. I got it right that time. And we are doing our pre-game show. It is in about 18 hours. Ole Miss is going to be kicking off against the Wake Forest Demon Deacons. Michael, how you doing, bud? I'm so excited to be on the road. I've had it out tomorrow, first road trip. I still get the jitters. It's always fun. Yeah, going out there and actually doing it is all right. The dread going up to it, knowing that you have to leave and everything, that's another story altogether. Yeah, and I'm not a great packer. So this is going to be, this is going to test me a little bit. So before we get on the Ole Miss Wake Forest Train, I do want to ask you about this, because you are from Southern California. You are a Pac-12 person. So now that the Park Tua is expanding to become the Six Pack, what is going on there and where do you think they go from here? It's so bizarre because I understand the draw of the Mountain West schools that have been invited and that have accepted of wanting to be part of the brand, the Pac-12 brand. But I think what's sort of getting lost here is that this isn't going to be the Pac-12 old in terms of they're not going to be an automatic qualifier for the playoff, they're going to be a group of five, six, whatever we want to call it now. I understand it sounds better than the Mountain West, but it's crazy because I used to work in Boise, and Boise State's been, they were almost in the Big East in 2012, way back when, that was a thing. That was insane that that was almost a thing. I think it was done in San Diego State. But I lived in Boise for, gosh, four years. And all they've wanted is to be part of a bigger conference and they're sort of getting it. But I've also worked at Wyoming, which was my job before here, and they're left in the Mountain West of what happens to us now because our biggest brands are now gone. So as I was listening to "Find Bomber" earlier, I think Ari Wasserman was saying, this is just going to lead to more realignment. This is all this does, it's crazy, though. I kind of like the idea of the Tupac, or whatever the Paktua has, as you called it, whatever. But I think for viability, yes, I think six makes sense. Eight, they need. So it's kind of wild and they announced it without having the other two teams. Because what happens if it falls through? I don't know, for me at least, I like to know a plan it's going to go through before I make a press release. Yeah, they probably have an idea of what they're going to be able to do, but we'll see what happens. I mean, I like the idea and the benefit that could come from all this is I think Air Force is going to end up in the American and have an Air Force army and Navy all in the same conference for the first time. That's actually, I think that's a good thing that comes out of all of this. Yeah, yeah, no, I agree. But of course, we talked about this before the show. Memphis always gets thrown around in these sorts of conversations and it's like, just leave Memphis alone, please. Yeah, it's like, they're probably in a game just like I told you. They're probably in a game of musical chairs and there are no chairs. Yeah, and they just kind of are where they are. And two-lane, I get the idea and the appeal of two-lane because they've been good recently, but it's, you don't have to dig very far to find when they weren't. Yeah, yeah, I mean, really, like, I mean, it's within five years. It's right there. So Ole Miss and Wake Forest is kicking off in between Dawson's Creek in a season premiere episode of Arrow on the CW tonight. That's 5.30 Central times, 6.30 Eastern. This is not the Riley Skinner Wake Forest. This is not the Sam Hartman Wake Forest. I think they're 15th out of 17th team preseason picked in the ACC. But Hank Bock Myers, a pretty good quarterback. They have a couple of good wide receivers and they have that tricky gimmicky long, long mesh play. And those things could make a first road game by Ole Miss at least difficult. Yeah, I mean, Hank Bock Myers again, like, it's very crazy. His first year at Boise State was 2019 and I was still out there. His first start, he started his first game as a true freshman against Florida State in a game that was moved because of a hurricane, if I remember correctly. And he beat Florida State on the road. So fast forward now, and Hank Bock Myers still in my life, which is, I never, I did not think that was ever going to be the case. But, you know, and Lang Kiffin said this week, this is by far the best passing game they will have seen thus far. It's a very competent passing game. I mean, I think Hank is eighth or ninth in the country in passing yards per game. His numbers are good. He hasn't turned the ball over. Now, their offensive line is a bit of a problem. I believe they gave up six sacks last week to Virginia in, you know, Virginia, maybe they end up having a night season, but I don't think they were anyone's, you know, power pick to have a breakout season. But yeah, I mean, in terms of a pure passing game, it'll be a test in, especially because Lane didn't sound particularly thrilled with how the pass defense played last week. And I know the numbers looked OK, but I think they expected better against the team like that, especially knowing that it's going to get worse in terms of quality of opponents. Yeah, and the bus need to stop. I talked about that on my arm show this week. They have to figure out a way to clean it up because they don't bust against Furman. They basically give up 70 yards for the entire game. If they don't bust against MTSU, that seven minute drive just doesn't happen. And that that is the drive that stands out to Ole Miss fans. I do believe. Yeah. And again, Hank is a strong arm kid. I mean, he was a big recruit. He can slay it and he's been slaying it for six years. He's very good. So this is going to be really interesting. Again, are they the most talented team? No, but it is an ACC team. And you know, it's their homecoming. It depends on who you ask, how sold out it really is. But it is their homecoming. What? Really? That's a bold move to pick Ole Miss to be your homecoming. But man, they're basically going, they're like replaying like prom night too, sitting there with the homecoming queen. And at halftime, that game has a chance to be a public execution. And you're going to set that up for a celebration? Yeah, I didn't believe it when I heard that. And I looked on the website and I was like, oh, this is real. This is actually their homecoming. You know, they did a schedule a little bit like 15 years ago. That's when I'm going to tell myself, because otherwise this doesn't make much sense. Do you think Ole Miss breaks out the new uniforms? They have not released them by the time of I've recorded this. By the time everybody hears this, they'll be out there. Do you think this is they're going to break out the new ones? Yeah, I mean, it'd be a good time too. I would say like a prime time game. Like it's, I mean, it's a Power 5 game. I know it's on the CW. But I think there's going to be a lot of eyes on that game. And I think, you know, again, you want to keep eyeballs and you want to get people talking about your team even, you know, in other ways besides the product on the field, the product's going to speak for itself. The people love uniforms and home accommodations. So I could see them do it, but I also could see them waiting until I don't want to see like a bigger game, maybe a home game or something like that. Yeah, it's right before the season finale is Smallville on the CW, or maybe Buffy the Vampire Slayer or something. Maybe 7,000. I think 7,000. Yeah, something like that. The CW, I remember like, what was the CW before the CW? It was something like WB? Yeah, it was the WB. That's right. Yeah, because I remember like, Animaniacs was on there when I was a kid. Oh, Animaniacs, man, I'll fight people over. Oh, great show. This is amazing. Amazing. Anyway, when we come back, we're going to continue to talk to Michael about the game today and Wake Forest and the storylines and some expectations and all of that good stuff that you're tuning in for. 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What are you waiting for? Head to factor meals dot com slash locked on 50 and use code locked on college 50 to get 50 percent off your first box and 20 percent off your next month. That's a factor meals dot com slash locked on college 50. So we're here with Michael Katz of the Northeast Mississippi Tupelo Daily Journal and we are getting ready with this pre-game show, we're airing at midnight on Saturday morning to get everybody ready when they first wake up. Michael, what are the storylines that you're going to be looking at in this game? I mean, I'm looking at the offensive line still, who's back because that sounds like something that is, there could be guys coming back, I know there's always a little thing. I think Jerk wants guys. That's who I thought it would think it would be, you know, looking at that group, how do they stand up against a power five defensive line or powerful defensive line? I'm curious on that. I also am really curious to see if this is the kind of game where Ole Miss establishes the run early or if they let Jackson cook early and sort of just let him throw it all over the yard because we've seen two very, very different sorts of approaches. I know, obviously, Jackson had a great game in, you know, last week with 24 straight completions, but it was really Henry Parrish's show for the start of that game. In that first game, it was Jackson throwing the ball anywhere and everywhere he wanted. So I'm curious to see like what the plan is and is it still, is it really, is it all Henry Parrish? Are we going to see more badly because, you know, he's only have, he's only has like 11 carries or whatever so far. When you, when does he start getting more involved because we know how explosive he is when he's been in there in his career, I'm curious to see what their philosophy is because whatever you think Lane Kiffin is going to do, he often does the opposite of what you think he's going to do in terms of what they're going to show you. So I think that's going to be really interesting. I'm also curious to see like what happens if, if, you know, Ole Miss fumbles the ball and Wake Forest runs the back for an early touchdown, like what happens when adversity actually hits this team. They haven't had that yet and I know this is a veteran team. They've got a lot of guys who've been on the road a lot and they've played a lot of really big games, but you just never know with a, with a new team, this is a new team with you guys, how a team is going to react in situations like that. You know, I have, I don't think that it's going to be a problem, I think this team is, is very mature, but you know, Jackson alluded to it. He wants to see what happens when adversity hits the team, you know, he said that before the first game, you know, if it does happen, you know, how do they react to it? You know, I had Kenton Gibb from Walked On ACC on my show this week and he was talking about Wake Forest and I asked him the question, who, what are the two weakest positions on Wake Forest's team? If you think something's going to go wrong, what are the two weakest positions? And his answers were the secondary and the offensive line and going up, going across from Ole Miss's defensive line and Ole Miss's wide receiver, going against your probable points, this is, this potentially is a nightmare match up for Wake Forest. Yeah, I mean, again, they gave up six sacks last week to Virginia and no disrespect to Virginia, but I have to imagine Ole Miss's defensive line is probably better. In Virginia's, it's going to be better than most of the teams that they faced, it's one of the best in the country. I mean, I think this can be a game where we really see them feasts, especially if guys like Princely are healthier, it sounds like he's getting healthier. You know, we, we, the games have been so out of reach, you know, we haven't really seen like, we've seen Walter Nolan dominate, but we haven't seen him dominate for whole game because he hasn't had, he hasn't really had to, they've been able to take them out. And we obviously, he got a little bit banged up in that last game, it sounds like he could have gone back in, but, you know, it wasn't worth it when you're up by 30. You know, this could be a game where you really see why he was as highly talented as he was, because a guy with that sort of athleticism of quickness and, and, and get off the ball. I mean, that guy against an offensive line that is, uh, porous, let's say, um, goodness. I think a guy like that confused. And like you said, Ole Miss's receivers are, are, are as good as anybody's, uh, having a leaky secondary, uh, isn't probably, uh, what you wanted in the game plan. Yeah. One thing that's interesting before we get out of here is, um, Ole Miss is third in the country and tackles for loss with 25, but they're like 35th in sacks. This isn't sacks bringing up this number. This is just, you can't run the football against these guys. And I think that's more of a positive than anything else because starting this week, starting today against Wake Forest, you're probably going to start to see Pete Golding actually scheming against protections to figure out a way to pressure the quarterback, because Wake Forest is a passing team. They do do that funky RPO, but they throw the ball downfield. Yeah. I, I think it's, it's pretty, it's become pretty clear it's going to be hard to run the ball on Ole Miss this year. And I, I don't, you know, it's not like they're going to give a 27 yards game for the entire season. Um, but that run defense is legit. It's very, very good. They are really good up the middle. Um, so when you start to make a team one dimensional and you get guys like Princeley, uh, getting, being able to pin his ears back and you can Pete scheming up guys off the edge and, and, and blitzes and whatnot, uh, that, that seems like a pretty bad, uh, uh, a nightmare scenario potentially for Wake Forest. Thanks again for making the lock down. Ole Miss podcast. You first listen every day. We're free and available wherever you get your podcast, including YouTube. We're part of the locked, locked on podcast network, your team every day. Michael Katz from the Northeast Mississippi Tupelo Daily Journal. Michael, what have you got going on this weekend? Obviously, you're going to Winston Salem, but what are your plans? Um, you know, I, I, I, uh, I will not have a car I'm Ubering, so I'm going to be at the mercy of whatever is around my hotel, um, but I'm just very excited to, to try out the local cuisines. Uh, and by that, I mean like sheets. I've never been to sheets. Apparently there's sheets, sheets right near my hotel. Um, my East Coast friends tell me it's, it's, it's a godsend. I'm very excited to go. Don't they do vinegar based barbecue sauce too? They might. They might. It's like a, it's like a, it's like a gas station with like a full restaurant inside basically. So excited for that. Oxford. Okay. Oxford. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Um, yeah. Um, yeah. No, I'm, I'm just excited to, to get to see a new place. I've never been to, to wait for us as campus or their stadium. I know it's a little bit on the smaller side, but I think sometimes those are some of the cooler stadiums when it's a little bit more intimate setting. I mean, Tulane last year was a really, really cool setting. And that was a really small stadium and that was a blast. So they have a nice looking stadium. They do. They do. And I, you know, wait for us. It's, it's, it's, you know, it's an ACC program. I'm expecting it to be fairly nice. I always love getting free food. That's one of my favorite parts of the travel. Um, so yeah, excited, excited to, to see what this team looks like on the road. Cause it's going to get harder from here. Uh, you know, this is, this, this is step one. All right. Michael safe travels buddy and we'll see you next week, but it's also good man. Appreciate you. 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