more bewildering when you look at the individual performances in that Kentucky loss. Henry Parrish and Tre Harris, two key playmakers who were out for the Georgia game, both had standout performances in the loss to Kentucky. Parrish averaged 4.8 yards per carry and found the end zone, while Harris exploded for 176 yards and a touchdown. Yet neither of them were available for the dominant Georgia win. It leaves you scratching your head—how could Ole Miss look so dominant against the Bulldogs with those absences, but then struggle with Kentucky at home with those key pieces back?
And then, just to add another layer of the paradox, Ole Miss scores a blistering 63 points at Arkansas, in a place where Arkansas had just taken down a solid Tennessee team—a squad with one loss and real playoff aspirations. Arkansas had shown they could compete with top-tier SEC teams, making Ole Miss’s offensive fireworks even more impressive.
It’s the kind of inconsistency that makes college football so frustrating and fascinating. The Rebels can beat Georgia one week and drop a game to a struggling Kentucky team the next. Yet, Ole Miss’s ability to score in bunches, as they did at Arkansas, shows just how dangerous they can be when they’re firing on all cylinders. If they can channel that level of play consistently, they could be a real threat in the postseason. But until they figure out how to avoid those inexplicable lapses, it’s hard to take their playoff contention for granted.