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Ole Miss Falls to No. 8 Missouri, 24-10
OXFORD, Miss. – The No.
24 Ole Miss football team converted on just one of its three red zone
trips Saturday night while No. 8 Missouri went 4-for-4, and the
difference ultimately proved to be too great for the upset-minded
Rebels as they fell 24-10 at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium.
“It’s
impossible to beat a top-10 team when you get in the red zone and don’t
score touchdowns or points,” Ole Miss head coach Hugh Freeze said. “We
had the blocked field goal, then a drop and a bad call on the reverse.
If you don’t score some points in the red zone against that team you
aren’t going to win.”
Playing in front of a sellout crowd
of 61,168 on a chilly night in Oxford, Ole Miss (7-4, 3-4 Southeastern
Conference) accumulated 378 yards of offense and 21 first downs, but
stalled inside the Tigers’ 20 and finished with its second lowest point
total of the year.
“We’re obviously disappointed that we
didn’t have a chance to win at the end,” Freeze said. “They are a very
good football team; they take you out of a lot of things. They are
excellent up front on both sides. We needed to play a good game and we
didn’t play well enough. We have to put it past us and move forward
with the short week.”
Junior quarterback Bo Wallace, who
battled flu-like symptoms throughout the game, finished with 244 yards
passing. Junior wide receiver Donte Moncrief had his fourth 100-yard
receiving game of the season, finishing with six catches for a
team-high 115 yards. Junior safety Cody Prewitt had a team-high 12
tackles and made his fifth interception of the season to lead the Ole
Miss defense.
As a unit, the Ole Miss defense played well
enough to hold Missouri’s offense to 24 points, which tied the Tigers’
lowest scoring output of the year.
Trailing 17-3 at
halftime, Ole Miss came out of the locker room with a bang, doubling
its entire running production from the opening 30 minutes with 78 yards
on four plays on its first drive of the second half, capped off by a
45-yard run by sophomore running back I’Tavius Mathers.
The
Rebels couldn’t find the end zone again for the remainder of the game
though, and Missouri (10-1, 6-1 SEC) capped off the game’s scoring two
drives later with a 10-yard run by Henry Josey, his second touchdown
rush of the game.
Ole Miss will close out its 2013 regular
season on Thanksgiving Day when it faces intrastate rival Mississippi
State (5-6, 2-5 SEC) in Starkville at 6:30 p.m. CT on ESPN. Ole Miss
defeated the Bulldogs 41-24 last season to bring the Egg Bowl trophy
back to Oxford for the first time since 2008.
“(Mississippi
State) is a good football team,” Freeze said. “They are so good up
front that they can be in any game. They will be very emotional, not
only because it is the Egg Bowl, but because they’re playing for extra
practices and a bowl game.”
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