Ole Miss players share challenge of playing through midseason coaching change

It was a difficult regular season for Ole Miss, going just 12-20 overall and 3-15 in SEC play. That got head coach Kermit Davis fired midseason, only giving the players another challenge to figure out and manage.

Now, two players, Robert Allen and Jaemyn Brakefield, spoke about overcoming adversity this year.

“Just to touch on the difficult part, not even the last few weeks, just this whole season me coming back from my knee injury and just pushing through that and having to walk and learn to do things again, I just feel like that’s been a big thing, and just keeping my head straight,” Robert Allen explained.

“I feel like in these last few weeks, I can just tip my cap to Coach [Win] Case, just keeping the outside noise outside. Everybody who is in the locker room who is a part of our program, is what we focus on and that’s the positive energy. That’s just what it’s felt like these past few weeks.”

Jaemyn Brakefield added that being able to overcome everything this season has been proof that Ole Miss is full of great leaders.

“I’ll just say it shows the leadership we have throughout our team. You know, just everybody staying down, from the freshmen to the seniors, and everybody’s following the gameplan and listening to Coach Case. And, we’re following right behind him and we love him and we’re right behind him.”

On Thursday, Ole Miss will take on Tennessee in the SEC Tournament.

Ole Miss has a chip on its shoulder

Very little is expected of Ole Miss in the SEC Tournament, even after beating South Carolina in the first round. After all, this is a team that finished 13th in a 14-team conference and had a mid-season coaching change. However, as Amaree Abram explained, this has helped give Ole Miss a chip on its shoulder.

“Just wanted to come here and play with a chip on our shoulder,” Abram said. “We just got something to prove. We taking it one game at a time.”

That’s a sentiment that Jaemyn Brakefield agreed with, saying, “I feel like we got momentum. Just coming in here, I knew nobody wanted to play us first round. We got a chip on our shoulder and we’re going to one game at a time. Now we’re gonna transition our focus on Tennessee. We’re gonna learn from in January when we played them and we’re gonna piggyback off that.”