After letting two huge leads slip in defeats to Florida State and Alabama in the opening three weeks of the season, #23 Ole Miss finally put together two strong halves of foofball to defeat the 12th ranked Georgia Bulldogs 45-14 at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium.
Chad Kelly was excellent at quarterback for the Rebels, completing 18 of his 24 attempts, throwing two touchdowns, while also running for one late in game, and most importantly he managed to avoid the turnovers which had hampered his team in their two losses earlier in the month.
Ole Miss continue first-half excellence to lead Bulldogs 31-0 after two quarters
The story of Hugh Freeze's teams season so far, has been letting big leads slip. This week however, the Rebels didn't allow for this to happen and after shutting out their opponents in the first-half, they kept their foot on the pedal for 60 minutes.
Already 3-0 ahead thanks to a Gary Wunderlich field-goal, Ole Miss' swarming defence got on the board before their offence, with Derrick Jones intercepting a pass over the middle from Jacob Eason, and taking it to the house from 52-yards.
The offence got the ball back, and after A.J. Brown hauled in a fade pass at the one-yard line, D'Vaughn Pennamon bulldozed his way into the endzone for a 17-0 first-quarter lead.
Kelly then took over in the second quarter, and began to torch the Bulldog defence. His first touchdown pass on the day came from 55 yards out, and was the first play of a drive. After taking the ball in the shotgun, Kelly launched the ball downfield into double-coverage, only for DaMarkus Lodge to pull the ball in as Ole Miss took complete control.
Tight-end Evan Engram capped a five-play drive at the end of the half with a nine-yard reception from Kelly as the home team took a 31-0 lead in an utterly dominant first-half performance.
Ole Miss are now outscoring their opponents 107-33 in first-halves this year, and the visiting Bulldog side couldn't have had a much worse time of it. Star running back Nick Chubb left the game with a knee injury, while drops from their receivers and poor blocking was giving Eason little chance of flourishing.
Ole Miss secure first win over Bulldogs in two decades
Having not beaten Georgia since 1996, losing ten-straight to the Bulldogs, Ole Miss were never going to let up after the half-time interval.
A seven-play, 70-yard drive straight after half-time, ended with a Eugene Brazley TD to extend the lead to 38 points, before Kelly rushed for a touchdown from 41 yards to provide a fitting climax to his day.
Suffering their first loss of the season, Georgia showed some fight in what was a lost cause, getting into the endzone twice thanks to Brian Herrien, but Kirby Smart's side were thoroughly outplayed and were eventually defeated 45-14.
Hugh Freeze told ESPN after the game that he was "really pleased" with the performance of Kelly, and that "we beat a good football team today." The Rebels coach also commented on how happy he was to get a lot of young players onto the field in the blowout win, which isn't ussually the case in SEC encounters.