All Sooners

SEC Announces Kickoff Time for Oklahoma-Ole Miss Game

The Sooners will travel to Oxford for the first time in program history.

Bryce McKinnis

Oklahoma coach Brent Venables locks arms with his team before the Red River Rivalry college football game between the University of Oklahoma Sooners (OU) and the Texas Longhorns at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2024.
Oklahoma coach Brent Venables locks arms with his team before the Red River Rivalry college football game between the University of Oklahoma Sooners (OU) and the Texas Longhorns at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2024. / BRYAN TERRY/THE OKLAHOMAN / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
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NORMAN — Oklahoma will play its Saturday, Oct. 26 game against Ole Miss in Oxford at 11 a.m., 247Sports' Tom Green first reported Monday afternoon.

Per Green's report, the game will air on either ESPN or ABC, its designation to-be-announced after Week 8.

Ole Miss won the only previous matchup between the Sooners and Rebels, 27-25 on Dec. 31, 1999 in the Independence Bowl in Bob Stoops' first season as OU's head coach and Brent Venables' first season as its defensive coordinator. The Sooners won their next 20 consecutive games, including the 2000 national title game against No. 3 Florida State, and won 11 or more games each of the five subsequent seasons.

Oklahoma's (4-2) matchup with Ole Miss will be its earliest kickoff so far this season and first head-to-head meeting between the programs as Southeastern Conference members. It will also be the Sooners' first trip to Vaught-Hemingway Stadium and its 65,000 fans. The Rebels (5-2) dropped nine spots to No. 18 in this week's AP Poll after a 29-26 overtime loss to LSU on Saturday. The Sooners fell from No. 18 to unranked after a 34-3 loss to No. 1 Texas in Dallas.

Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin spoke about Oklahoma's and Texas's joining the Southeastern Conference at SEC Media Days in July.

"You talk about two of the top programs in the history of college football [OU and Texas], and then as I look at things, too, like I said earlier, places that are really hard to play and then you get these night games filtered in and places get really hard to play with fan bases like Oklahoma and Texas. That's really exciting for the conference, and continues to kind of elevate the super conference. "

The matchup will be Venables' and Kiffin's first meeting as head coaches, but the pair have coached against each other several times in subordinate roles. Venables conducted Clemson's defense while Kiffin orchestrated Alabama's offense in the Crimson Tide's 45-40 win over the Tigers in the 2016 College Football Playoff Championship. Kiffin was on USC's staff in 2005 when the Trojans defeated Oklahoma, whose defense was under Venables' direction, 55-19 in the BCS title game.

The Sooners will host their first true home game in nearly a month. Kickoff is scheduled for 11:45 a.m.

Published |Modified
Bryce McKinnis
BRYCE MCKINNIS

Bryce is a contributor for AllSooners and has been featured in several publications, including the Associated Press, the Tulsa World and the Norman Transcript. A Tishomingo native, Bryce’s sports writing career began at 17 years old when he filed his first story for the Daily Ardmoreite. As a student at the University of Central Oklahoma, he worked on several award-winning projects, including The Vista’s coverage of the 2021 UCO cheer hazing scandal. After graduating in 2021, Bryce took his first job covering University of Tulsa and Oral Roberts University sports for the Tulsa World before accepting a role as managing editor of VYPE Magazine in 2022. - UCO Mass Communications/Sports Feature (2019) - UCO Mass Communications/Investigative Reporting (2021) - UCO College of Liberal Arts/Academic presentation, presidential politics and ideology (2021) - OBEA/Multimedia reporting (2021) - Beat Writer, The Tulsa World (2021-2022) - Managing Editor, VYPE Magazine (2022-2023)

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