Rebel Rewind: Ed Orgeron Era Begins With Lackluster 2005 Ole Miss Season

The Ole Miss Rebels entered the Ed Orgeron era with the 2005 football season in Oxford.

Feeling nostalgic? You've come to the right place.

Over the next three weeks, The Grove Report is taking a look back at the Ole Miss Rebels' football seasons from 2003 to the present day. Why begin with 2003? I'm glad you asked.

For one, it provides a nice 20-year baseline (give or take) from the 2023 season that just concluded. It also happened to be the senior year of Eli Manning, providing a nice look at multiple eras of Ole Miss football in the process.

Yesterday, we took a look at the 2004 season, and today, we turn the page to 2005.

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The Dawning of a New Era

David Cutcliffe was fired as the Rebels' head coach following the 2004 season, and that ushered in Ed Orgeron as the new program CEO. It was Orgeron's first FBS (then Division 1-A) head coaching position, but he had served as an assistant on the staff of the USC Trojans during national championship runs in recent seasons.

Sounds promising, right? Well...it wasn't, but it would be a little while before Ole Miss figured that out.

A Lackluster Opening Act

The Orgeron era began with a win as the Rebels took down Memphis on the road by a final score of 10-6 on Sept. 5. After a bye week, Ole Miss would drop games to Vanderbilt (31-23), Wyoming (24-14) and No. 10 Tennessee (27-10) to fall to 1-3 on the year.

It appeared that the struggles of 2004 were beginning to progress into 2005 as well, even with a head coaching change.

Part of that was due to still not having a set quarterback on campus. Michael Spurlock would up with the most playing time under center in this season (1,703 passing yards), but Ethan Flatt and Robert Lane also saw playing time again in Orgeron's first year. The trio of Rebels combined for only nine touchdown passes on the season, and they put up 18 interceptions as a unit.

October Brings Two Wins

After a 1-3 start, Ole Miss found a couple of wins in the month of October, although one of them came against an FCS (Div. 1-AA) opponent. The Tennessee loss came on Oct. 1, but here are the results for the rest of the month:

vs. The Citadel (W 27-7)

vs. No. 6 Alabama (L 13-10)

vs. Kentucky (W 13-7)

at No. 19 Auburn (L 27-3)

The loss to Alabama came thanks to a drive in the final minute by the Tide that set up a 31-yard field goal to secure the win and keep them undefeated on the year. The Rebels obviously did not fare as well against the other SEC team from the state of Alabama, dropping a blowout to the Auburn Tigers on The Plains.

Rebel Rewind: Ole Miss Regresses in 2004 Following Eli Manning Departure

An Even Worse Closing Act

The final three games for Ole Miss were among some of the worst of the season. The Rebels fell to Arkansas (28-17), No. 4 LSU (40-7) and Mississippi State (35-14) to close out a 3-8 campaign.

The Egg Bowl loss was Ole Miss' first in the series since 2001, and it came in a season where the Bulldogs also finished with a 3-8 record. The win over Ole Miss served as State's only SEC win of the season.

Year In Review

"Nondescript" might be a poor word choice to describe the 2005 season, but that's all that comes to mind. It was the second straight year without a bowl berth for the Rebels, and it was another season of mediocrity in a stretch that would persist for the next few campaigns.

Combining the final scores of all 11 games, Ole Miss was outscored 245-148 in 2005, and the combined record of the teams it defeated was 14-20. Ironically, half of those wins came from the Memphis Tigers who finished the year as Motor City Bowl champions, taking down Akron 38-31 in that contest.

The loss to Wyoming at home was another Mountain West embarrassment like 2004's as the Cowboys only finished 4-7 on the year.

Final Record: 3-8 (1-7 SEC)

Biggest Win: at Memphis

Worst Loss: vs. Wyoming

Key Stat: 13.5 PPG (117th out of 119 teams)