Pete Golding and the Ole Miss defense regrouped after Mercer threw a haymaker early
Saturday could not have gotten off to a better start for Ole Miss. Three plays into the game the Rebels were up a touchdown and the offense looked poised to do whatever it wanted to to the Mercer defense — and it did.
Then it was time for the new and improved Ole Miss defense led by coordinator Pete Golding to show off all its offseason and fall camp work. One play in and Lane Kiffin‘s investment into Golding was looking a little questionable.
Mercer quarterback Carter Peevy went 75 yards down the middle of the field untouched for the touchdown and leveled the game at 7-all less than two minutes in.
The Golding era was not off to a shining start and Kiffin made sure to let his new defensive coordinator know it.
“I said on the headset that, ‘We paid a lot of money, Pete, for you and that’s not exactly what we’re expecting,'” Kiffin said. “That wasn’t a real good start.”
Whether Kiffin’s comment was fully tongue-in-cheek or had a little bit of sting to his words Golding and the defense responded the rest of the day.
Following Peevy’s touchdown run the Mercer offense managed only 18 more rushing yards the entire game. Through the air the Bears were held to 142 passing yards, zero touchdowns and one interception.
The bounce-back was big for the Ole Miss defense and after one miscue to start the game Golding’s defense looked more like what had been reported throughout fall camp.
“The first play broke on the quarterback pulling it but we settled in after that and played really well. We’ll see things on film and work on some issues,” Kiffin added.
The Rebels defense finished four sacks on the day coming from Suntarine Perkins, Zxavian Harris, Cedric Johnson and Akelo Stone.
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Related: The Chuckys: Handing out awards from Ole Miss’ season-opening, 73-7 thrashing of Mercer
New faces on the Ole Miss defense impressed throughout the game but it was the play of Perkins that had everyone talking.
The true freshman linebacker led the Rebels with nine tackles to go with his sack and he also had a pass breakup. Of those nine tackles 7.5 of them came in the second half, which is when Perkins made his presence felt.
Perkins first career sack came in the fourth quarter when he ran down Peevy from across the field. Plenty has been said and written about the potential Perkins has but Saturday was the first time it was physically witnessed by everyone in attendance at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium.
“I wasn’t surprised. That’s how this guy has played in every practice he’s been in and every scrimmage,” Kiffin said of Perkins. “That’s what we expected him to be. That’s why we put a lot of energy into recruiting him. We haven’t really had a defensive impact freshman like that so it’s really good to see.”
The lone interception of the day by the Ole Miss defense came from safety Daijahn Anthony in the third quarter.
Anthony, who transferred in from Liberty, is just another newcomer to this Rebels defense that made an immediate impact in his first game.
“We’ve been preparing really hard for about two weeks for this game,” Anthony said. “We treated it like a really big game, because every game is a big game. After facing coach Kiffin’s offense for the last five weeks, and then flipping to Mercer’s offense, it was definitely a big difference. Overall we prepared really well, which is how we got the results we did today.”
