'I'm highly concerned': The Ole Miss run game's slow start has Lane Kiffin's full attention
This time last year Ole Miss was showing the rest of the college football world what it had in freshman running back Quinshon Judkins and its run game.
Judkins would go on to rush for nearly 1,600 yards and 16 touchdowns to earn the Southeastern Conference rushing title for 2022. The start to this season is lacking in those video game-type numbers and Judkins has not gotten out of the block as far as his individual season is concerned.
Last Saturday the Tulane defense held Judkins to his second lowest rushing total of his career with 48 yards. Only total lower is 44 yards in the Vanderbilt game last season.
The Ole Miss offense is supposed to be centered around the run game and Judkins leading that charge. Through two games the Rebels have 232 yards and averaging 116 a game, putting them as the 11th best rushing offense in the SEC.
“I’m highly concerned,” said Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin of the run game on Monday. “That’s very unusual for us. Not just here. I mean anywhere, really. This job, Alabama (I don’t remember) inability to run the ball. At all.
“(Tulane) did a great job but it obviously had a lot to do with us, and that’s everybody. That’s perimeter blocking, that’s lineman execution, running back footwork. It’s everything. …It takes everybody to have a good running game. So, we definitely look to improve there. That’s a major issue and one I don’t think anyone would have guessed.”
To put numbers with the conversation, Judkins is off to much slower start than last year. This is visibly apparent but when looking at the stat sheet it shows why there is alarm in Kiffin’s tone.
Through Judkins first two games in 2022 he rushed for 191 yards and was averaging nearly eight yards a carry. After facing a Mercer and Tulane defense he has 108 yards and averaging barely 3.5 yards per carry.
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With less than half of last year’s yards per carry up to this point Judkins has done so with seven more carries in 2023.
Judkins is off to a sluggish start in his second year with Ole Miss, but there is also concern with the offensive line’s start to the year.
Mercer was an anomaly of a game and one where judging any player or group’s performance for how the next 11 games would go is moot.
Tulane’s defense was running circles around the Ole Miss offensive front at times throughout the first half. Quarterback Jaxson Dart was sacked four times on Saturday and the only time Judkins was effective was as a passer for three catches and a touchdown.
Very little rotation within the offensive line as Micah Pettus, Quincy McGee, Caleb Warren and Jeremy James were in nearly the entire game, playing 63 snaps. Victor Curne was close by with 57 snaps on Saturday.
Eli Acker and Jayden Williams did not see much of the field at Yulman Stadium, combining for eight snaps and Acker making up only one of those.
“(Tulane) did a lot of movement up front. We didn’t handle it very well,” Kiffin added. “Created negative plays and didn’t finish things. They came off blocks and made plays or we didn’t turn back when we should’ve. They were very aggressive in what they did, defensively, after that first series.”
