Ole Miss football reached rock bottom against Alabama

Alabama poisoned the wells in the first half, pushing Ole Miss back deep into their own territory on multiple occasions, and the Tide never let up from there. Nick Saban absolutely crushed Ole Miss on Saturday night, because he could, because his depth chart runs far deeper than Ole Miss’ depth chart, because the Rebs dared disrespect him in 2014 and 2015.

Alabama slaughtered Ole Miss in a four hour-long murder that began at kickoff and ended sometime around the final whistle. It doesn’t really matter because this murder transpired on national television and we all watched it. We all know when the death event occurred, and it was sometime during the first quarter. Then Bama kept stabbing. They should have, because Ole Miss is terrible.

Ole Miss made history on Saturday, but very bad history. In 1917, Ole Miss lost 64-0 to Alabama. On Saturday, September 30 2017 they improved on that performance with a 66-3 failure to Alabama in Tuscaloosa. The most points scored on an Ole Miss team in program history since Texas completed the same in Oxford in 2012, as far as we know.

This here team is fucking awful. This here team cannot defend nobody. This here team gave up 23 damn points to UT-MARTIN. This here team allowed Jalen Hurts to go full Cam Newton on them. Hurts threw for 192 yards — modest, sure — but he tossed two touchdowns besides. We know he’s good, but Ole Miss makes, made, him look really good. Shea Patterson looked downright lost on many plays, and he’s one of the country’s best quarterbacks. That’s what the Tide does to people.

This Alabama game was an utter failure at every level of Ole Miss football operations. Not even the players wanted to be there, and hell Missouri did the same thing not so long ago. Just look at the damn numbers.

Ole Miss’ success rate was a mere 24 percent. Alabama’s was 49 percent, which somehow feels a touch lower than expected. The Rebs coughed the ball up twice to Alabama’s none. Ole Miss’ average starting field position was their own 21 yard line, which again feels a bit more forward than expected. Bama averaged starting field position from their own 38. THIRTY EIGHT.

Ole Miss “executed” one more drive than the Tide with 14, but “completed” just 55 plays to Bama’s 75. That means that Bama scored a lot and Ole Miss fizzled into annihilation even more. The Rebs gained just 253 yards — an insignificant amount in the context of college football — while Alabama gained ... 613 yards. Again, that somehow feels a whiff lower than how the night turned out.

Perhaps it’s cathartic that this kneecapping happened this early in the season and at the hands of the probative favorites for the national championship. Perhaps a rock bottom such as this will be enough to allay your expectations of whatever for the remainder of the season. It’s weird to tell yourself you’re not going to invest too much of yourself in this game, but then 9 p.m. ET on Saturday night rolls around and you’re already a few deep and, well, here you are shouting your head off about field position, of all things.

But there is real catharsis in this particular loss. If it were at all a close one, I’d feel pretty bad today. I was laughing my head off at 66 points with friends in the bar even before time expired on Saturday night. The Falcons just lost to the Bills, and, well, that’s kind of funny as well. You should feel however you want to feel about what happened Saturday night, but don’t let that follow you around for more than, at most, 24 hours.

It’s fucking Alabama, after all.