Mark Ingram on Ole Miss' chances to win SEC: 'Ole Miss, at some point, will Ole Miss'

Ole Miss climbed to No. 4 in the lastest Associated Press Top 25 poll following last Saturday’s 24-19 home upset of previous-No. 4 LSU in Oxford. It’s the Rebels’ highest ranking in the AP poll since it was No. 3 for two weeks in 2015 before losing on the road to Florida in Hugh Freeze‘s fourth of five seasons at the helm.

A decade later, Ole Miss (5-0, 3-0 SEC) appears primed for a longer stay among the AP Top 5, especially since the Rebels are on a bye this weekend ahead of next week’s home game against Pac-2 holdover Washington State (3-2). But it does get dicey from there with back-to-back SEC road games against No. 12 Georgia and No. 5 Oklahoma to close out the month of October.

In the meantime, college football fans and pundits alike have debated whether this could be Ole Miss’ year to really establish itself as a true SEC superpower and vie for its first SEC title since 1963 during the heyday of the legendary Johhny Vaught era in Oxford.

Of course, not everyone is exactly confident in the Rebels’ chances at conference supremacy. In fact, former Alabama running back-turned-FOX Sports analyst Mark Ingram III poured a little partisan water on Ole Miss’ conference championship aspirations during this week’s The Triple Option podcast with co-hosts and fellow Big Noon Kickoff show analysts Urban Meyer and Rob Stone.

“It’s still early. … Do they look really good? Yes they do. Trinidad Chambliss is really balling over there at Ole Miss, the defense is playing strong and fast,” Ingram said Wednesday. “But we’ve seen in the past, Ole Miss, at some point, will Ole Miss. So, they look good, but, you know what I mean, it’s still early.

“The SEC is just really deep, Mizzou looks really good, Vandy is undefeated going into Alabama – and we need our get-back. Oklahoma has been really good even though we know (quarterback John) Mateer has the hand injury. Texas A&M with Marcel Reed, Texas has yet to play an SEC game. So it’s still too early to be able to tell. Ole Miss looks to be a contender, and that’s why I’m going straight down the middle.”

Even if the Rebels manage to split the SEC road games vs. Georgia and Oklahoma, they’ll still have to avoid stumbling in November home games against South Carolina and Florida before hitting the road for the always-competitive Egg Bowl at rival Mississippi State. Suffice it to say, as Ingram spelled out, Ole Miss’ road to Atlanta is full of potential speedbumps along the way.