What Mercer head coach Drew Cronic said about facing Ole Miss
The first game on Ole Miss football’s 2023 schedule happens to be the second game on Mercer’s schedule.
Saturday’s season opener inside Vaught-Hemingway Stadium will be the second straight week the Bears have played in someone else’s stadium. Last week’s 17-7 win over North Alabama was played at Cramton Bowl in Montgomery.
For Ole Miss it is another season-opening game against a FCS opponent. Mercer (1-0) is currently ranked No. 20 in the FCS Coaches Poll while the Rebels are a unanimous No. 22 team in both the Associated Press and AFCA Coaches Polls.
A step up in competition for the Bears, certainly, after playing the Lions in Week Zero.
Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin stated on Monday that his team will have its “hands full” in preparing for Mercer. On the other sideline Bears head coach Drew Cronic spoke to the obstacle in playing up a weight class in the Rebels.
“This is a game where you can learn a lot about yourself,” Cronic said this week. “And you can make some improvements because if you don’t, you’ll get smoked on that play. If you don’t do what you’re supposed to do because of the talent level (of Ole Miss).
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“What I try to impress upon our guys is, ‘Look, if you’re going to be a playoff team, and I’ve said this before. They may not have 11 guys like that on the field at the same time but they’re going to have four or five. So you’ve to learn how to hold up against extremely talented kids who are really good players by doing the right thing.'”
Cronic went to emphasize Mercer has players “who can play” and do not have “a bunch of scrubs running around.”
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Saturday’s game marks the first time in 112 years Ole Miss and Mercer have met on the football field.
The Rebels hold the 1-0 advantage in the series, beating Mercer during the 1911 season.
While this is not an Alabama or LSU-type opponent to open the season Kiffin was still approaching Mercer the same way in how Ole Miss is preparing with No. 24 Tulane looming in a week in New Orleans.
“These guys played well Saturday, they played very well last year, they played extremely hard,” Kiffin said on Monday. “Even if you go back two years ago when they were at Alabama, how well they played on defense. How well they played early, but especially on defense, that game and the problems they gave them. We’re going have our hands full, and have to prepare really well.”
Ole Miss and Mercer will kickoff at 1 p.m. CT on ESPN+ / SEC Network+.
