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On3’s PicKell: Ole Miss has BIG, transformational potential as a 2024-25 contender

Ben Garrettby:Ben Garrett•07/01/24•

SpiritBen

NCAA Football: Mercer at Mississippi
(Petre Thomas-USA TODAY Sports)

Ole Miss football has seemingly taken one hit after another on the recruiting trail over the last week. 

The most recent prospect to defect was four-star running back Akylin Dear. Dear is the No. 36 overall player in the 2025 class. He’s the No. 2 player in Mississippi.

The general fan response of confusion and very-loud frustration has been both predictable and understandable. However, Ole Miss players and coaches have all but collectively shrugged it all off.

Which isn’t all that unlike the response from On3 national college football analyst JD PicKell.

“Ole Miss on the high-school-recruiting level will recruit in the 20s. Sometimes high-teens, low-20s,” PicKell said on the latest edition of his ‘Hard Count’ podcast. “It’s not bad at all. For a lot of schools, that would be their best year.”

Ole Miss has dropped 17 spots, from 20 to 37, in On3’s team recruiting rankings. EDGE Corey Amos and a pair of four-star wide receivers in Dillon Alfred and Jerome Myles all re-opened their respective recruitments on the same day, June 24.

But Ole Miss has made a habit of building its rosters almost exclusively through the portal under fifth-year head coach Lane Kiffin. Even more, when it comes to prep players, Ole Miss, philosophically, won’t overextend itself financially. The Rebels, in essence, stick to their number.

They haven’t been nearly as restrained in the portal. Just two of the Rebels’ 22 projected starters for next season are non-transfers. They won a program-record 11 games last season and signed the No. 3 transfer class.

“Ole Miss has the potential to reinvent how we all view roster-building over the last three years,” PicKell said. “Ole Miss has taken 65 total transfers, including some guys, like Jaxson Dart, who I think has a shot to be in the Heisman conversation this year.”

Yet PicKell somehow didn’t have the quarterback-receiver combo of Dart and Tre Harris amongst his Top 10 nationally. 

Harris is the highest-graded returning wide receiver against single coverage in the SEC. Dart has the fourth-best odds to win the Heisman.

“It’s funny, it gets brought up here and there by the guys, but my mindset is winning every single day and being 1-0 that day,” Dart told the Ole Miss Spirit’s Jake Thompson last week. “I feel that if I do that everything else will come with it. But my focus is winning and going 1-0 each and every day.

“Really like the energy that we bring every single day. It’s a very positive atmosphere. I’m very happy with where we’re at.”

Ole Miss opens against Furman in 61 days. The Rebels are expected to contend for the now-expanded, 12-team College Football Playoff.

“Tre Harris pretty much did whatever he wanted last year. He was a stud,” PicKell continued. “You bring in Juice Wells this cycle to up your pass attack even further. One of the top receivers in the SEC from a couple of years ago from South Carolina.

“Let’s say Ole Miss plays for a national title. Forget winning the whole thing, they just prove they’re squarely in that discussion to compete for hardware at the highest level. That’s going to reinvent how we look at the portal.”

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