Ole Miss Football: Recruiting Takes A Hit With Freeze Departure

Ole Miss football has been taking some hard hits lately. The most recent have come in the form of recent loss of commitments.

Ole Miss football recruiting took an especially hard throat punch with the loss of three out-of-state commitments in the span of eight days. It began with Jaylin Williams of Germantown, Tennessee last Saturday and was followed by two more yesterday. Portsmouth, Ohio native Blaine Scott and Oklahoma City, OK native Israel Antwine de-committed Sunday. Of course, there is no doubt the resignation of Hugh Freeze played a major part.

There are a number of reasons these three losses will hurt Ole Miss football recruiting in the weeks to come. Blaine Scott was all-in before Freeze resigned, however after some time to think about his other options he dropped his commitment. Scott, 6’4″ and 310 lbs was selected to the Under-Armour All-American team and is ranked a 4 star OG. Scott had been playing a major influence on the recruiting trail.

It Gets Worse

Ole Miss Rebels Football

If you think things couldn’t get any worse, well think again. Sunday night Ole Miss football lost another out-of-state recruit in Israel Antwine.

Antwine is rated a 3-star defensive tackle by Scout.com and has the size and talent to be a formidable SEC tackle. And he may just be playing against Ole Miss now with his recent de-commitment.

According to 247Sports.com  Antwine actually announced his de-commitment from Ole Miss less than two hours after Scott.

David Johnson of Rebels247 points out Antwine cited Freeze’s faith-based program as one of his reasons for his commitment in the first place.

Recruits have a major influence over other recruits and the decisions they make in regards to spending their playing days. This is more than evident in the timing of the de-commitments of both Antwine and Scott.

Next: So What's Next?

This could have a serious snowball effect should Ole Miss football head coach Matt Luke not get a fast grip on the 2018 class. When you consider this recruiting class had 10 hard commits just 10 days ago, losing 3 hurts. It is especially bad to lose 2 in less than two hours.