⏳ THE COUNTDOWN
18 days to Louisville at Nissan Stadium in Nashville · 31 days to LSU in Oxford · Ranked No. 9 in the AP preseason poll · Second scrimmage this weekend
Good morning, Everydayers. 🦈
Ole Miss had its first scrimmage this weekend, and Bryan Brown just told us exactly what it was for. Not what it looked like — what it was for. And once you hear it, the whole thing makes sense.
First, credit where it belongs. Almost everything we know comes from one place: Harry Harrison of the Ole Miss Radio Network was in the press box and broke it all down on the Cannon Motors Rebel Yell Hotline with Gary Darby, Chuck Rounsaville and Yancy Porter. That’s the best scrimmage reporting anybody did this week and it isn’t close. Go listen to it.
🎧 “No coaches on the field”
That was an NFL preseason opener. Look at who didn’t play.
Trinidad Chambliss took one series and watched the rest. Kewan Lacy, in Harrison’s words, didn’t sniff much. Mekhi Frazier very limited. Deuce Alexander barely on the field. Will Echoles held out. Suntarine Perkins held out. Most of the interior offensive line and most of the secondary held out.
Now tell me that isn’t Week 1 of the preseason.
Then Brown explained it. The staff played a lot of players specifically to see the ones who hadn’t been in that environment — in the stadium, and here’s the part that unlocks everything: there were no coaches on the field. They had to figure it out themselves.
That was the test. Brown said it plainly — they wanted to see who can communicate with nobody out there to help, and who can make plays in that setting. He called it a genuinely different environment twice.
So it wasn’t load management. It was a diagnostic aimed at the back end of the roster, to make sure your depth is actually your depth. Chambliss doesn’t need to prove he can communicate in an empty stadium without a coach standing next to him. Echoles doesn’t. Perkins doesn’t. The 22nd man through the 75th man absolutely does.
That’s exactly what a preseason opener is for.
📡 From the box to the field
And Brown gave up one more thing nobody caught.
He talked about eliminating the bumps in the road by game time, and the phrase he used was “from the box to the field.” Because Brown is coaching from upstairs this season, with Pete Golding still calling the defense from the sideline. Brown described his own job as being Golding’s eyes in the sky.
That’s a communication chain that did not exist a year ago — and they were rehearsing it in an empty stadium in the middle of August. Teams normally save operations work for the mock game the weekend before the opener. Ole Miss is easing into it early, and that piques my curiosity.
Everybody in that press box was watching which backup made a play. The coordinator was listening to whether his headset worked.
That sounds small. It isn’t. A busted communication chain in the fourth quarter on the road in Austin is how you lose a game you should win.
How to weight all of it: nobody panics when a starter sits in Week 1 of the preseason, and nobody crowns a backup for shredding a third team. But it matters, because the starters were never the question. The question is what happens when one goes down in October.
Two caveats. It wasn’t full contact — Rounsaville called it a pseudo scrimmage: thud, real contact on both lines, nobody to the ground, two-hand touch on the backs and the quarterback. Harrison said four separate times that it makes the run game nearly impossible to judge. And unlike a real preseason game, there’s no film and no box score. The only people with tape are on that staff.
Brown’s own review was measured — ups and downs, gave up some plays, made mistakes and corrected them on the sideline. Then he credited the offense unprompted, which he didn’t have to do. That’s a coordinator telling the truth about a controlled practice instead of selling a headline.
🎯 The young guys who showed up
Deuce Knight was the star, and it wasn’t close — and the reason I care isn’t the performance. It’s the comparison.
Go back to spring, because Harrison watched him then too. His read was that Knight was tentative — didn’t know which receiver to go to if the blitz came. He called him a “one-hit wonder”: take the snap, first step, throw to the first receiver whether he’s open or not.
This weekend he was spot on. He didn’t complete everything. But when they blitzed him and got in his face, he found the hot receiver. He went through his progressions. He threw some deep balls. And Harrison said the thing that matters: if something happened to Chambliss, he thinks Knight steps in and Ole Miss is okay.
Understand that in preseason terms. Knight wasn’t beating anybody’s first team. He was doing exactly what a good backup quarterback does in a preseason opener, in the precise situation you’d need him. That’s not a knock — that’s the point. Rounsaville credited Joe Judge, and Harrison agreed Knight is a different player throwing it now. Remember Chambliss told us at media day that Knight is constantly asking him what he sees and how he reads coverage.
Up front: Carius Curne played a good bit at right tackle and Harrison was more impressed than expected — somebody’s gotten in his ear, and maybe he’s turned the corner. (With that many starters out, which group he was with is genuinely unknowable.) Are we close to the light bulb coming on? If it is, he has the talent to be the starting right tackle.
Tommy Kinsler looked good. Terrez Davis at left tackle looked very good — the second independent confirmation of what Golding said at media days. Bryson Sanders was clean on every snap at center — no high ones, no low ones, nobody chasing a football.
At tight end, Harrison singled out Brady Prieskorn and one other young player. What I’m hearing: Prieskorn is TE3, and he’s the one who replaces Caleb Odom in 13 personnel.
And on defense, the name Harrison volunteered without being asked was Keaton Thomas. Brown went further the next day — tough, a great competitor, always in the building watching film, and hungry to prove he belongs in this league. Brown called him a bell cow. That’s four separate sources in seven days: Pick Six, Brett Ciancia, Harry Harrison, and now his own coordinator.
⚡ The rest, and one concern
With the top two backs barely playing, Shakai Mills-Knight and JT Lindsey carried it. Lindsey broke a long run — terrific speed, probably the fastest back in the room outside Lacy, and he’s not getting caught from behind. Mills-Knight at 6-3 and around 220 is a weapon inside the 20. (Remember the two-hand-touch caveat — but pure speed on a long run is the one thing it can’t fake.)
On the defensive line with Echoles and Perkins out, the two who flashed were Blake Purchase and Jonathan Maldonado. (Context for why that room matters this much: Ole Miss led the nation in rush defense in 2024 at 85.1 yards a game. Last season that number was 154.1.) And here’s a good one: the next day Brown named those same two, unprompted, when asked who replaces the pass rush that left in the portal. Two independent observers, same two names, 24 hours apart.
Jamarious Brown and Jehiem Oatis handled the interior. Tah’j Butler projects as the third linebacker, first man off the bench.
Jordan Renaud was in there but not dominant — mostly standing up in pass-rush looks. Harrison’s fair caveat: Renaud missed spring, and there just isn’t enough to see yet.
And the concern: Caleb Cunningham played. That’s real news, because he hadn’t been out there. He caught a touchdown on a fade. They also threw him a long post and he didn’t have the acceleration to go get it, and Harrison isn’t sure he’s 100%.
Both halves are the story and I’m not picking one. He’s back on the field, which is what we wanted. He’s also not right yet, three weeks out. But you don’t run a man coming off a hamstring in a preseason opener — a handful of snaps, a fade and a post is exactly the right usage. That’s a rehab appearance. Reading it as a health verdict either direction is a mistake.
🏆 And one thing from 2004
Brown was asked about Suntarine Perkins winning the Chucky Mullins Courage Award, and he said Perkins represents everything that award stands for.
Here’s what people miss. Bryan Brown played defensive back at Ole Miss. So did Marcus Woodson. If you were around this program in the first couple of decades of that award, the way you look back on it is just different. Those men think about it differently than someone who won it much later would. That’s not a criticism of anybody — it’s proximity. And I’m almost ashamed Brown only got one question about it, because for those guys it means so much.
Which sent me back. 2004, Ole Miss and Tennessee. I’d just gotten out of the Navy, just enrolled, working in the video department — and I bought season tickets anyway, because that’s what I wanted. We were sitting in the north end zone, back when it was bleachers. Eric Ainge threw a hitch or a screen, and Bryan Brown jumped it and took it to the house. One of the coolest things I’ve ever seen. Ole Miss lost, because 2004 was rough. But that’s one of only two things I remember from that whole season.
The man who made that play now calls this defense from the box.
🔗 Five links for your Wednesday
- The number that explains this entire defensive offseason. The Rebel Walk’s D-line preview has it: Ole Miss led the nation allowing 85.1 rushing yards a game in 2024 — and that climbed to 154.1 last season. That’s the whole reason Golding spent the way he did. 👉 Read it
- Golding on day one: “It really didn’t feel like the first day of camp.” After spring, summer and Baker’s install, his point was that nobody was starting over — and that getting healthy was the biggest August objective. 👉 Read it
- What to actually watch in camp. Ole Miss On SI’s list, and the Chambliss item is the right one — not arm strength, but how he communicates at the line and responds after mistakes. Which is exactly what the scrimmage was testing. 👉 Read it
- Golding calls it one of the deepest, most competitive rosters he’s had — and says the buy-in in Oxford runs deeper than the talent. Also the quote that predicts this scrimmage exactly: he wants players in as many game-like situations as possible. 👉 Read it
- The 2026 schedule. TV windows and kickoffs as they’re announced. 👉 Bookmark it
🚨 The Ole Miss Hub goes live August 24
Everything in one place — articles, both YouTube channels, the Discord, the Everyday Club. olemisshub.com, and you can browse it now.
And I’ve been named the host of Locked On Ole Miss Hits — a second channel with two 5-minute shows a day plus verticals. This is the biggest expansion we’ve ever done.
💬 Join the Locked On Ole Miss private Discord — it’s FREE
Camp intel, practice reports, and every availability broken down. Completely free to join.
👉 https://discord.gg/KF3dtcQJhC
The second scrimmage is this weekend. In preseason terms that’s your Week 2 game — when the starters play longer and the picture gets real. That’s the one to watch.
Hotty Toddy. 🦈
— Steven Willis, Locked On Ole Miss