Mercer Bears excited for ‘big stage’ of the SEC and a ‘really good football team’ in Ole Miss
Ole Miss football opens the 2023 season Saturday at 1 p.m. CT.
However, its opponent, the Mercer Bears, already have a win under their belt.
Mercer was one of the handful of teams across Power 5 and FCS to participate in last week’s still-relatively-new Week 0. The Bears came away with a 17-7 win over UNA. Mercer was 7-4 last season, including a 5-3 mark in the Southern. The Bears won five straight games following a 42-16 loss to Auburn — a long-time SEC West rival of Ole Miss.
“It’s a matter of (Mercer head) coach (Drew) Cronic getting a good critique and review of where this team is,” said Rick Cameron, the voice of Mercer athletics, in an interview with the Ole Miss Spirit’s Chuck Rounsaville and others.
“The win over UNA was a good one. Now you step into the Southeastern Conference against a really good football team. If you’ve got weaknesses, they’re probably going to be exposed this day.
“The one thing about coach Cronic is the team has bought in. They have a theme of love, compete and belief. With all the transferring that’s going on in (college football), we only had two players leave from last season. The last two years we’ve been right on the brink of making the playoffs.
“So this is a veteran team. I think they’re very much excited of playing on the big stage in Oxford and just laying it on the line and seeing what happens.”
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Ole Miss is an overwhelming favorite against Mercer.
The Rebels last season won eight games and reached the postseason for the third consecutive year under now-fourth-year Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin.
However, unlike Mercer, the Rebels, in the off-season, dramatically overturned their roster through the portal. They added nearly 50 newcomers. Nearly 30 came by way of transfer, and the majority were on defense.
Ole Miss hasn’t released a depth chart for the opener, but if preseason training camp this month is any indication, at least seven of the Rebels’ 11 starters on Saturday could be transfers.
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Ole Miss is also on its third defensive coordinator in three years. Pete Golding served the previous three seasons as Nick Saban’s defensive coordinator at Alabama.
“Everyone at Mercer is aware of stepping into the SEC and the talent level,” Cameron said. “We’ve played Alabama twice, we’ve played Auburn twice. We’re aware the competition is really, really good. We know that.
“The best thing Mercer has going at this point is it has a lot of (defenders) that not only have played a lot of football, but because of the pandemic, they’ve played a lot of football together.”
Mercer is returning 10 of 11 defensive starters. Several were named preseason all-conference. Junior linebacker Isaac Downling was the Most Valuable Player of the FCS Kickoff against UNA.
“These 10 guys, they know each other,” Cameron said. “You’ve got the guys that finished the year last year strong and they’re right back in the starting lineup again.
“This is probably the best defensive unit coach has had.”
