Ole Miss looking to make history as it prepares for another night game at 'magical' Auburn
When the kickoff time was announced for this week’s game between No. 13 Ole Miss at Auburn many shook their heads and felt a chill come across them.
This is due to yet another night game at Jordan-Hare Stadium for the Rebels (5-1, 2-1 Southeastern Conference) who will kickoff against the Tigers (3-3, 0-3) at 6 p.m. CT this Saturday on ESPN.
As if this game on this year, in particular, needed any more storylines added to it with Lane Kiffin heading to the place he was rumored and reported to be taking over as head coach 11 months ago to Hugh Freeze taking on his former team for the first time as a SEC head coach again.
Now the fact of Ole Miss taking on Auburn in its stadium at night, a place the Rebels are 0-9 overall in the series when playing after dark. This stat dates back to 1985 when the two teams played in Auburn at night for the first time.
The Rebels are not the only team to have issue with the Tigers in their home environment when it comes to night games, but they sure seem to have the toughest time getting in the win column of this specific category.
“I don’t know that answer. The analytics support it certainly,” Kiffin said on Monday of the difficulties in playing Auburn at home. “You can see our record there. We like breaking records. Someone said if we win this game it’s the first back-to-back wins against Auburn in 71 years, so that’s a pretty exciting thing to be able to do.
“I just think that place, having played there (with Ole Miss), having played there at Alabama, just sometimes has kind of some magical things happen at it. Games are always sold out, the fans seem to be into all the games from the beginning on, and they seem to play better there, especially at night if you look at the stats over the years.”
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Kiffin is correct in stating that if Ole Miss wins on Saturday it will be the first back-to-back wins in the series since 1951-52.
The Rebels held off the Tigers for the 48-32 win in Oxford last season.
On Tuesday Kiffin was already taking the proper steps of preparation to try and secure his first win at Auburn as the Rebels head coach. The Tigers fight song, among other things such as crowd noice, was being played loudly on the practice field.
For JJ Pegues it is a return to the place where he started his college career. The former Oxford High School standout chose Auburn on his signing day before transferring to Ole Miss last year.
“It’s going to be real loud,” Pegues said on Tuesday. “They got a great atmosphere. It’s going to be a hostile environment. We just go to be on great communications and just have little keys on offense and defense and go in there and get a win.”
Jordan-Hare has a capacity of just over 88,000 but it will not be the biggest crowd Ole Miss has played in front of this year. The game at Alabama last month was played in front of over 100,000, which has some new faces on the Rebels roster prepared for this Saturday.
“I feel like if you can play at Alabama in front of 106,000 people then you can play anywhere,” Quincy McGee said. “It was kind of rocking and anywhere else is going to be like that. I feel like Alabama did set me up for the rest of the year.”
