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The SEC has claimed the last seven BCS national championships so, of course, the team that scored the most surprising success yesterday on National Signing Day, wasn’t one of the schools that has raised the crystal ball.
Ole Miss, Eli Manning’s alma mater, is poised to become one of the big dogs in the nation’s toughest football conference after signing a top-10 recruiting class.
The Rebels’ success is nothing short of remarkable considering the top recruits in the Southeast can opt for traditional powers such as national champion Alabama, Florida, Georgia and LSU. Those schools, led by Alabama, enjoyed their annual talent haul but Ole Miss joined the party.
“The biggest vision that we have is to do something new and fresh, and convince a group of young men to come together and want to be different,” said second-year coach Hugh Freeze. “To do something different and fresh at a place that may not be the norm. To upset the apple cart. That’s what went about with this recruiting class.”
Ole Miss didn’t upset the apple cart, it kicked it over. The Rebels landed the nation’s No.1 recruit, defensive end Robert Nkemdiche, and the No.1 offensive lineman in Jaremy Tunsil. If you are going to win in the SEC, you must have a physical presence.
“We can do something special,’’ Nkemdiche said.
So can Alabama. After winning back-to-back national titles and three in four years, Nick Saban kept the bar high with the nation’s No.1 class.
Ohio State, the closest program the Big Ten has to an SEC school, reeled in the second best class. Urban Meyer, whose team is now eligible for postseason play, is poised for a title run.
Florida, now that Will Muschamp is firmly entrenched as the head coach, had a second straight top-five class. Muschamp brought in a defense-heavy class.
Notre Dame parlayed its first undefeated regular season since 1988 into the nation’s fourth best recruiting class, dispelling the notion that the Irish could no longer recruit elite players because of tough academic standards and no league affiliation.
LSU rounded out the top 5 giving the SEC three schools at the top. Ole Miss (8), Texas A&M (9) and Georgia (10) give the SEC 60 percent of the top 10 — nothing new there.
What is new is the rise of Ole Miss. The school’s facilities — Vaught-Hemingway Stadium seats 60,580 — is dwarfed by other SEC powers.
But Freeze’s can-do personality and the team’s 7-6 record, capped by a 38-17 thrashing of Pitt in the Compass Bowl, have changed perceptions.
“We’ll start having to manage expectations right now because we’ll still be in the second year of our journey together, but I do think we took a huge step forward today on our journey to getting to where we want to get,’’ Freeze said.
“And that’s competing for an SEC West championship.”