First road trip of the season presents 'challenges' for an Ole Miss roster full of new faces
Road games are nothing new to a college football player, but with a roster full of new players such as Ole Miss’ those first trips of the season can be difficult.
When the ball kicks off at 2:30 p.m. CT at Bobby Dodd Stadium in Atlanta it will be mostly business at usual for No. 20 Ole Miss (2-0), but there will be some adjustments.
The Rebels played their first two games of the season at home inside Vaught-Hemingway Stadium, allowing for all the transfers and high school signees to get properly acclimated to their new program and team.
Now, these new Ole Miss faces will be taken out of their comfort zone for the first time this season. Something head coach Lane Kiffin sees a presenting “challenges.”
“I’ve said all along this transfer thing, there’s good and bad,” Kiffin said during his Monday press conference. “Everything’s new. So now we got to go on the road with all of these guys that have never been on the road with us and challenges that come with that. It’ll be a very big test for us.”
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So far the meshing of new Ole Miss players and returners has started off well through the first two games of the season.
In this past Saturday’s 59-3 win over Central Arkansas all but one touchdown was attributed to new players. Quarterback Luke Altmyer’s touchdown run was the only touchdown by a returning player.
The offense has gelled through two weeks with running backs Zach Evans and Quinshon Judkins being the only duo in the country to average at least 90 yards rushing. Michael Trig became only the second Ole Miss tight end to have a three-touchdown game.
Still, there is the need of improvement in Kiffin’s eyes. There is also the responsibility of not losing focus by taking part of the first trip of the season.
“It’s just really travel and focusing on what we need to focus on,” Kiffin said. “Not get out of whack because you’re in a different stadium. This game is on ABC and these guys (need to) understand none of that matters.
“They just need to perform really well, which we have at times and like I said it’s a very talented room of players Probably collectively, from a lot of numbers the most talent in our three years of being here. Maybe not the superstars, but they got a long ways to go.”
Of course there are veteran players sprinkled throughout the roster who will be leaned on.
One such person is Nick Broeker, who has seen his fair share of road games in his Rebel career.
Broeker along with the rest the returning players have begun talking to the younger locker room about how this weekend will go and what an Ole Miss trip looks like.
“Kind of being older now we can kind of look down at the younger guys and be like, ‘This is how it works when we travel on the road. This is how the schedule is going to be,'” Broeker said. “It’s a business trip. When we travel for away games we still have an expectation of leaving with a win.”
