Ole Miss still has not released a depth chart. For the second straight week, the snap counts wrote one anyway — and this time they came with grades attached.
The Rebels ran 60 offensive snaps and played 65 on defense in Saturday’s 41-9 win over Charlotte at Vaught-Hemingway. That is 21 fewer offensive snaps than the Louisville opener and five fewer on defense, and the drop is the whole point: a 27-0 halftime lead bought Pete Golding the one thing an SEC staff almost never gets in September, which is a long, meaningless fourth quarter to look at people.
He used it. Thirteen defensive linemen were charted. Nobody on that line played more than 24 snaps. And two players who were on the field for better than half of the Louisville game did not register a single snap.
Here is what the usage says, position by position, with the Louisville share alongside it.
Offense
Quarterback
Trinidad Chambliss took 44 of 60. Against Louisville he took all 81. That is the cleanest single measure of how different these two Saturdays were.
What he did with them is the part worth keeping. Chambliss dropped back 29 times and graded 91.0 as a passer — the highest passing grade on the team, and the kind of number that is difficult to post even against overmatched competition, because the grade rewards throw difficulty rather than completions. He finished 23-of-26 for 225 yards and two scores.
Deuce Knight played 15 snaps and posted the highest overall offensive grade on the team at 91.9. Read that with the sample size in front of you: eight dropbacks, four designed runs, an 86.7 rushing grade doing most of the lifting, and a defense that had stopped caring. It is a clean, efficient mop-up shift from a young quarterback, and it is not a quarterback conversation.
Running back
| Player | Snaps | Share | vs. Louisville | PFF offense |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kewan Lacy | 37 | 62% | 46% | 82.0 |
| Makhi Frazier | 17 | 28% | 28% | 62.2 |
| JT Lindsey | 3 | 5% | 26% | 58.5 |
| Joshua Dye | 2 | 3% | — | 59.7 |
This is the number that should get the most attention this week, and it is the one nobody will talk about.
Kewan Lacy’s snap share went up in a 32-point win. He played 46 percent against Louisville before leaving that game; he played 62 percent against Charlotte, in a game that was over at halftime, and he was still out there on 19 passing snaps. He graded 85.7 as a runner and turned it into 88 yards and two touchdowns.
There is no version of that which is load management. Meanwhile JT Lindsey went from 21 Louisville snaps to three — so the three-man rotation that looked settled a week ago is now a clear one-two with Makhi Frazier, who took 17 and graded 70.0 in pass protection, the part of the job that actually keeps a backup on the field in an SEC game.
Wide receiver
| Player | Snaps | Share | vs. Louisville | PFF receiving |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Horatio Fields | 30 | 50% | 84% | 72.4 |
| Deuce Alexander | 29 | 48% | 79% | 77.3 |
| Caleb Cunningham | 19 | 32% | — | 81.9 |
| Traylon Ray | 16 | 27% | 25% | 66.9 |
| Johntay Cook II | 16 | 27% | 46% | 64.3 |
| Samari Reed | 15 | 25% | 4% | 53.4 |
| Darrell Gill Jr. | 12 | 20% | — | 56.4 |
| Dillon Alfred | 10 | 17% | — | 75.3 |
| Jase Mathews | 2 | 3% | — | 57.8 |
Nine receivers played. Not one of them was on the field for even half of the offensive snaps, and the two nominal starters both lost better than thirty points of share from the opener.
Caleb Cunningham is the name in this table. Nineteen snaps, thirteen of them on pass plays, six catches, 65 yards, and the best receiving grade on the team at 81.9. Six catches on thirteen passing snaps is a target rate that does not happen by accident.
The honest read on it is narrower than the production suggests, and it is more interesting than the production suggests. Every one of those catches was a hitch. He was not schemed open, and he was not handed a route tree. What he was handed was a body nobody else in that room has, and he broke tackles with it.
Golding, afterward: “Guys are softening off on him… that hitch can go 60 at any minute because he could break a tackle… I think he could be a big piece of the offense.”
That is the argument. It is not that the staff opened anything up for him. It is that this offense does not reach its ceiling if every receiver wins the same way, and Cunningham is the only one built to win a different way.
Tight end
Luke Hasz led at 35, with Michael Smith at 25, Hayden Bradley at 18 and Brady Prieskorn at nine. Eighty-seven tight end snaps across 60 plays is heavy two-tight-end usage, and Smith’s 71.5 run-blocking grade was the best on the entire offense — he is the blocking half of that rotation and he did the job.
And then there is the absence. Caleb Odom played 47 snaps against Louisville and does not appear in the Charlotte report at all. He was the second tight end a week ago, he made the catch that set up the game-winner in Nashville, and against Charlotte his snaps went to Smith and Bradley. Nothing in a snap-count report explains why a player is not in it. This one needs an answer before Saturday.
Offensive line
| Player | Snaps | Share | vs. Louisville | Pass block | Run block |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Terez Davis | 53 | 88% | 100% | 84.9 | 55.1 |
| Patrick Kutas | 53 | 88% | 100% | 83.7 | 63.8 |
| Brycen Sanders | 53 | 88% | 100% | 64.3 | 61.8 |
| Connor Howes | 45 | 75% | 43% | 81.2 | 61.3 |
| Delano Townsend | 40 | 67% | 94% | 74.8 | 66.7 |
| Troy Everett | 19 | 32% | 6% | 39.1 | 63.3 |
| Carius Curne | 14 | 23% | — | 75.3 | 59.3 |
| Joe Koury | 6 | 10% | — | 73.2 | 63.6 |
| Emanuel Faulkner | 6 | 10% | — | 74.0 | 59.7 |
| John Wayne Oliver | 6 | 10% | — | 73.6 | 59.7 |
The right tackle competition that stayed open through the entire Louisville game appears to have closed. Tommy Kinsler IV played 46 snaps in the opener and did not play against Charlotte. Connor Howes went from 35 snaps to 45, and graded 81.2 in pass protection. As with Odom, the report says what happened and not why.
The protection numbers are the story underneath the story. Three of the five linemen who played the most graded above 81 in pass blocking, Davis leading at 84.9 across 33 pass-blocking snaps. That is the second straight week the pass protection has held up as the most reliable thing about this offense — and Chambliss going 23-of-26 is what it looks like from the other end.
One note on reading that table: the report tags both Howes and Kutas at right guard and lists no right tackle at all, which is a labeling quirk rather than a formation. Take the snap counts as the real information and the position labels as approximate.
Defense
Defensive line and edge
| Player | Snaps | Share | vs. Louisville | PFF defense |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Will Echoles | 24 | 37% | 70% | 75.3 |
| Jonathan Maldonado | 24 | 37% | 39% | 70.0 |
| Kam Franklin | 24 | 37% | 54% | 64.1 |
| Michai Boireau | 21 | 32% | 31% | 58.5 |
| Suntarine Perkins | 21 | 32% | 60% | 69.4 |
| Blake Purchase | 21 | 32% | 54% | 70.1 |
| Jordan Renaud | 20 | 31% | 20% | 63.2 |
| Landon Barnes | 20 | 31% | 4% | 53.1 |
| Andrew Maddox | 19 | 29% | 11% | 56.3 |
| Jamarious Brown | 18 | 28% | 36% | 54.3 |
| Jehiem Oatis | 17 | 26% | 21% | 57.5 |
| Jayden Curtis | 10 | 15% | — | 52.2 |
| Talib Graham | 8 | 12% | — | 69.0 |
| Kamron Beavers | 7 | 11% | — | 57.0 |
| Carmelow Reed | 6 | 9% | — | 60.1 |
| Jamarion Owens | 2 | 3% | — | 49.9 |
Sixteen bodies across the front. Against Louisville it was nine defensive linemen and everyone marveled at the depth; against Charlotte it was thirteen, plus three edges, and the busiest man in the group played 24 snaps.
Will Echoles led the group in grade at 75.3 and split his 24 snaps evenly between run defense and pass rush. Jonathan Maldonado’s 75.7 against the run was the best mark up front.
Suntarine Perkins played 21 snaps. Sixty percent of the defense against Louisville, thirty-two percent against Charlotte. The best player on this defense was on the field for less than a third of it, which is exactly what you do with the best player on your defense when you are up 27-0 at half and LSU is six days away.
Worth one line for the fun of it: Talib Graham posted a 90.4 pass-rush grade, the highest single grade on the defense. It came on two pass-rushing snaps. File it, do not build on it.
Linebacker
Luke Ferrelli led the entire front seven at 46 snaps, with Tahj Butler at 43, Keaton Thomas at 32 and Jarcoby Hopson at nine.
Butler graded 76.2, second-best on the defense, and held his snap share steady from the opener — the only front-seven player who did. He is not a replacement for an injured Thomas anymore; he is in the rotation on merit.
Ferrelli is the complicated one. He played the most and graded 63.6, with a 76.6 against the run and a 50.8 in coverage across 26 coverage snaps. The run-defense number says he is where he should be. The coverage number, against this opponent, is the thing to watch when a team that can actually throw comes to town.
Secondary
| Player | Snaps | Share | vs. Louisville | Coverage | PFF defense |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jaylon Braxton | 49 | 75% | 100% | 80.0 | 80.1 |
| Jalyn Crawford | 43 | 66% | 91% | 71.8 | 71.9 |
| Ladarian Clardy | 32 | 49% | — | 65.1 | 70.5 |
| Nick Cull | 31 | 48% | 34% | 68.9 | 70.8 |
| Edwin Joseph | 31 | 48% | 93% | 35.1 | 45.2 |
| Joenel Aguero | 28 | 43% | 99% | 64.4 | 66.6 |
| Dante Core | 28 | 43% | — | 59.2 | 61.9 |
| Anthony Robinson III | 25 | 38% | 66% | 58.2 | 52.7 |
| Andy Jaffe | 20 | 31% | — | 60.4 | 53.9 |
| MJ Preston | 17 | 26% | — | 64.3 | 67.3 |
| Dorian Barney | 10 | 15% | — | 72.2 | 73.6 |
| Gerald Lacy Jr. | 9 | 14% | — | 62.2 | 66.5 |
Twelve defensive backs. Jaylon Braxton played the most and graded the best on the whole defense at 80.1, including an 80.0 in coverage across 26 coverage snaps. Two weeks, two games, two of the best corner performances on this team. That is no longer a small sample.
Seven safeties played and none of them reached half the snaps. That room is the least settled on the roster, and the grades in it ranged from Nick Cull at 70.8 down to Edwin Joseph at 45.2, the lowest mark on the defense, with a 35.1 in coverage. Joseph also posted a 73.5 against the run, the second-best run-defense grade in the entire secondary — so this is a specific problem on a specific night, not a verdict on a player the staff has talked about since the spring. It is still the number LSU’s staff will find first.
Antonio Kite, who lasted six snaps in Nashville, did not play. Shareef Denson, a fall-camp starter, has still not played a snap this season.
The projected chart, based on usage
OFFENSE
- QB — Chambliss, with Knight in relief
- RB — Lacy, then Frazier
- WR — Fields, Alexander, Cunningham; Ray and Cook II rotating
- TE — Hasz, then Smith in blocking sets; Odom’s status open
- LT — Davis · LG — Townsend · C — Sanders · RG — Kutas · RT — Howes
DEFENSE
- DL — Echoles, Maldonado, Franklin, Boireau in the primary rotation, with Renaud, Brown and Oatis behind them
- EDGE — Perkins and Purchase
- LB — Ferrelli and Butler, with Thomas
- CB — Braxton, Crawford, with Clardy in the slot and Core fourth
- S — Cull, Aguero, Joseph — unsettled
What it actually tells us
The staff showed nothing and learned plenty. No defensive lineman above 24 snaps, the best defender on the field for a third of the game, and a quarterback who watched the last quarter and a half. If LSU’s staff sat down Sunday hoping to find out what Ole Miss does on third down, they got sixty snaps of vanilla and a running clock.
Two spots resolved without an announcement. Howes over Kinsler at right tackle, and Cunningham into the top three at receiver on production rather than promotion. Neither came with a press release. Both are visible in the snap counts.
Two questions got louder. Caleb Odom went from 47 snaps to none, and the safety room played seven men without settling on three. One of those is an availability question somebody will have to answer this week. The other is a problem that a 41-9 win does not solve and LSU is specifically built to expose.
And Kewan Lacy’s usage went up in a blowout. Everything else on this list was the staff protecting something. That one was not.
LSU visits Vaught-Hemingway on Saturday at 7:30 ET on ABC. Ole Miss still has not released a depth chart.
Snap counts and grades via Pro Football Focus. Photo: Deuce Knight runs the ball during the fourth quarter, September 12, 2026, at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Petre Thomas-Imagn Images.
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