Ole Miss Football Defense Finished 2024 With Elite Ranking in Stop Rate

The Ole Miss Rebels boasted one of the top defenses in college football in the 2024 season.
Mississippi Rebels cornerback Chris Graves Jr. (32), from left, safety Trey Washington (25), and safety John Saunders Jr. (5) work to tackle Duke Blue Devils wide receiver Eli Pancol (4) during the first quarter of the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025 at EverBank Stadium in Jacksonville, Fla. [Corey Perrine/Florida Times-Union]
Mississippi Rebels cornerback Chris Graves Jr. (32), from left, safety Trey Washington (25), and safety John Saunders Jr. (5) work to tackle Duke Blue Devils wide receiver Eli Pancol (4) during the first quarter of the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025 at EverBank Stadium in Jacksonville, Fla. [Corey Perrine/Florida Times-Union] / Corey Perrine/Florida Times-Union / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
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The Ole Miss Rebels have long been viewed as an offense-first program under the leadership of coach Lane Kiffin, but that script was somewhat flipped in 2024.

Kiffin's Rebels were good on offense, yes, but their bread-and-butter came on the defensive side of the ball with a unit led by coordinator Pete Golding and a host of new transfers. On Tuesday, light was shed on just how strong the Ole Miss defense was this season in a story from ESPN.

It was there that the "stop rate" among college football defenses in 2024 was broken down. Stop rate is a pretty basic stat that tells a big story: the percentage of opponent drives end in a punt, turnover or turnover on downs.

For Ole Miss, that number was 75.9 percent, good for fourth in the country. To put that into perspective, that means that the Rebels surrendered an average of 1.28 points per drive this season.

Those numbers will win you a lot of ballgames.

And that's what Ole Miss did in 2024, despite not reaching the College Football Playoff. The Rebels finished with their third 10-plus-win season in the last four years, claiming a blowout victory in the Gator Bowl over Duke to cap off the campaign. And the calling card for most of the year was defense.

That side of the ball for the Rebels was led by a host of All-American talent, including names like DL Walter Nolen, EDGE Princely Umanmielen, DL JJ Pegues and LB Pooh Paul who helped the team allow just 80.46 rushing yards per game at a 2.2 yards-per-attempt clip. Ole Miss also finished third in the country in sacks, getting to the quarterback 52 times throughout the year.

All of that is good news for the Rebels, but there is some bad news that follows it. Ole Miss is set to lose a lot of its defensive production this offseason to the NFL Draft, and it is looking to shore up those spots with a heavy push in the transfer portal. The Rebels have added some help at edge rusher in Princewill Umanmielen (younger brother of Princely) and Da'Shawn Womack, and they have also added some linebacker talent in Jaden Yates and others.

Will that be enough to keep the program near the top of this statistical category in 2025?

READ MORE Ole Miss Rebels News:

Jaden Yates Reveals Reasons For Transferring to Ole Miss Football This Offseason

Three Ole Miss Rebels Make ESPN's List of Top 100 College Football Players in 2024-25

'Mark My Words': Austin Simmons Says Ole Miss Football Will Play in CFP Title

What Needs to Happen For Ole Miss Football to Make Playoff Push in 2025?

2025 Ole Miss Football Offense Beginning to Take Shape Following Latest Portal Commit


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John Macon Gillespie
JOHN MACON GILLESPIE

John Macon Gillespie is the publisher of The Grove Report and has experience on the Ole Miss beat spanning five years.