Countdown to Ole Miss football: The far out 60s have arrived

Well, well, well, if it isn’t the consequences of the inevitable march of time.

Just like that, we’re almost to half a hundred days to go until the start of the 2023 Ole Miss football season. The speed with which we are moving through this countdown is both encouraging and anxiety-inducing because every time I turn around, it’s time to add to the countdown.

The official remaining days count sits at 64 on this Friday before July 4th. That is a mere nine weeks away, which is smidge over two months, or the emotional length of every Egg Bowl.

Because we’ve reached the 60s, we must pay homage to the decade that brought us flower children and their peace and love utopia TRASH. How dare they not embrace the meat grinder of life on this planet.

Seeing as 2023 will likely be the last season Ole Miss plays all six of its fellow SEC West brethren in the same year, it’s only right to offer messages of peace and love as we go our separate ways and see each other every few years.

To do this, I will say six nice things about all six of Ole Miss’ SEC West opponents in 2023. It’s sort of like #BamaRespectWeek for everyone, though obviously more respect for Alabama because equal respect is not respecting the Tide, which is something we never do.

Alabama

1. Tuscaloosa is right off I-20.
2. I saw the Avett Brothers play in Tuscaloosa.
3. One of my college roommates had a house on Lake Tuscaloosa, and it was fun to visit.
4. The football program has fewer gun-related problems than the men’s basketball program.
5. The agreement between the football and men’s basketball programs to both not make the final four was touching.
6. The football program introduced so many fans across the conference to Dodge Chargers.

Arkansas

1. Fayetteville is only about an hour off I-40 rather than the seven hours it seems like it is.
2. The trees in the Ozarks changing colors in the fall is a spectacular scene.
3. I have not watched Ozark, but I’ve heard it’s pretty good.
4. The last time I went to Fayetteville, Arkansas was blowing out Ole Miss in the third quarter, and we got to leave early. Made it home at least an hour and a half before we thought we would. TIME IS THE BEST GIFT.
5. I’ve never been to a game in Bud Walton Arena, but I have walked inside and it seemed like a good environment.
6. This is still one of the most physically dominant runs I’ve ever seen (shout-out to the offensive line for destroying people).

Auburn

1. Now home to a Buc-ee’s!
2. They did wait to hire a guy who got in the DMs of a sexual assault victim to harass her over comments about his despicable bosses once their first (and only other choice) turned them down.
3. The last time I went to Auburn, Ole Miss was getting blown out in the third quarter (a common road game theme!), which meant it was time to leave early*. Got back to a friend’s house in Birmingham in time to go out for dinner prior to taking in the night games.
4. Just in case you missed number two, I said they did wait to hire a guy who got in the DMs of a sexual assault victim to harass her over comments about his despicable bosses once their first (and only other choice) turned them down.
5. The eagle flying around the stadium before a game is awesome, not because of a tradition, but because a FREAKING EAGLE flying 10 feet over your head is SICK.
6. They hired a guy who lost, at home, to New Mexico State 49-14. While that sounds mean, it could’ve been 56-14.

*There is no greater swing of emotions than watching your football team getting the shit kicked out of it on the road, then deciding to walk away before the fourth quarter. One minute you’re ready to never watch football again, the next you are flying high with the joy of being released from hell. Throw in zero traffic getting out of town, and it’s better than any kind of drug man can produce.

Brief aside: after leaving an Ole Miss/Georgia game early, made it from Athens to Atlanta in under an hour, and from Atlanta to Birmingham in less than two hours. PEAK TRAVEL.

LSU

1. Speaking of traffic, the only joy of being stuck in postgame Baton Rouge traffic after an Ole Miss win is listening to the LSU radio call-in show (870 AM for the OGs). If science could figure out how to liquify that experience and provide injections, THAT would be the best drug man could produce.
2. It once took me about two hours to get through Baton Rouge and over the Mississippi River bridge going west. While awful, it was better other horror stories I’ve heard.
3. I mean, LSU boosters didn’t steal THAT much money from a children’s hospital, considering it’s Louisiana. Initially, I would’ve ballparked the theft around $20 or $30 million. While $500,000 is a lot, it’s way less than people in Phil Bryant’s administration who allegedly* stole from poorest people in the state of Mississippi (at least $77 million).
4. If I had to rank chicken finger establishments, I wouldn’t put Raising Cane’s last.
5. If one of those dumb shows on CBS or FOX doesn’t do an episode where Mike the Tiger escapes from his inclosure and terror ensues, what a waste of primetime television.
6. On a serious note, getting to see Mike the Tiger up and about is a great experience.

*Again, for the lawyers out there, ALLEGEDLY. Who’s to say what happened? We are committed to allegedly. Respect our decision.

Mississippi State

1. Represents 33 percent of the Golden Triangle.
2. Part of a quarter of a million coaching search stories that say something like “Coach X has a house at Old Waverly,” which is good internet dot com.
3. In the fight before the 1997 Egg Bowl, they only let one recruit get his nose broken.
4. The NCAA did not allow Ole Miss to interview Dan Mullen about his actions related to its 5-year investigation of Ole Miss. Notably how Mullen knew, in April of 2016, that the NCAA had secretly expanded its Ole Miss investigation, while Ole Miss didn’t find out until June*.
5. The football program is 1-1 against Ole Miss in games where an Ole Miss player does a fake dog pee celebration after scoring a touchdown.
6. When Dak Prescott pooped his pants on Senior Night in Starkville, and Mississippi State was down 28-3 with 10:45 to play in the second quarter, they only lost by 11 (38-27).

*I know the Ole Miss/Mississippi State rivalry is nationally irrelevant (other than ESPN praying for a circus on Thanksgiving), but if, say, Auburn teamed up with NCAA investigators to go after Alabama, and it came to light, no one would ever stop talking about it. Documentaries in 2085 would bring this up.

Texas A&M

1. I live in Austin, Texas, which means it’s a three-hour roundtrip for me to go to College Station.
2. If you know where to park in College Station, you experience zero post-game traffic (assuming you aren’t staying there or in Bryan). And no, I will NEVER tell you where to park, lest you take an easy escape spot from me.
3. During the 2014 game, I sat with my dad in the very (VERY) top row of the upper deck. While getting to our seats was a vertical climb similar to that of ascending K2, once we got there, we had a cement wall to lean against. Hamstring, glute, and quad burning? You bet. Back pain related to awful posture on metal bleachers? NO SIR.
4. After the 2016 game (the Shea Patterson game), an A&M fan came up to me and my dad to say congratulations, but more importantly, get the details on where he needed to park his RV when he came to Oxford for the 2017 game. Good conversation, great dude, and I hope he enjoyed the trip.
5. My kingdom for a Jimbo Fisher/Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud joint press conference after the Texas A&M Legacy Society agrees to a 25 percent ownership stake from the Public Investment Fund.
6. I didn’t go back to Mississippi for Thanksgiving in 2011, which was a huge negative points from mom situation. Instead, I attended the last Texas/Texas A&M game on Thanksgiving night. It ended with a scramble from Case McCoy (which was hilarious) to get Texas into field goal range with a shot to win the game.

Texas brought on some dude named Justin Tucker to attempt a game-winning field goal. Hope it worked out for him in the NFL.