Ole Miss will tip off its regular season Monday night at SJB Pavilion, opening at home against Alcorn State at 7:30 p.m. CT. The game will be shown on SEC+ and carried on the Ole Miss Radio Network.
The Rebels enter with a one-sided history in the matchup. Ole Miss is 6-0 all-time against Alcorn State, including five wins in Oxford and one at a neutral site in Jackson.
Those six games have gone the Rebels’ way by an average of 25.3 points. The narrowest margin was a 76-70 Ole Miss win on Dec. 7, 1985, while the biggest came on Dec. 19, 1991, when the Rebels rolled 111-67.
The teams last played on Dec. 29, 2025, a 79-43 Ole Miss victory in Oxford.
Ole Miss comes into the opener with plenty of recent production to point to from its exhibitions. Against UAB, Budd Clark paced the offense with 18 points on 7-of-10 shooting and added a team-high seven assists.
Santiago Trouet finished just shy of a double-double with 12 points and a team-best nine rebounds, while Patton Pinkins posted 15 points, four assists and three rebounds. Ben Henshall added 14 points, three assists and two rebounds, Corey Stephenson scored 12 points with four boards, and Roman Siulepa chipped in 11 points and four rebounds.
That UAB game also showed how balanced Ole Miss can be. Clark, Henshall and Siulepa accounted for 28 of the Rebels’ 44 first-half points.
A lineup featuring Clark, Trouet, Henshall, Siulepa and Pinkins outscored UAB 22-12 over 5:41, and Ole Miss shot 42.9 percent from beyond the arc in the first half, hitting 6 of 14. The Rebels assisted on 22 of their 32 made shots, had six players score in double figures and saw 12 lead changes and 15 ties.
Ole Miss held the lead for 23:48 and controlled the paint, outscoring UAB 38-14 there, including 26-8 in the second half.
There was also a battle-tested note in the exhibition against Alabama at Boutwell. Corey Stephenson led the way with 25 points on 8-of-12 shooting and hit three 3-pointers.
Siulepa had 12 points and five rebounds, Trouet grabbed a team-high seven rebounds, Clark posted 15 points, seven assists and four steals, and Pinkins added 11 points, three rebounds and a steal. In the first half, Ole Miss trailed by 11 with 4:13 left, then trimmed Alabama’s lead to three by halftime while outscoring the Tide 15-2 in points off turnovers.
The Rebels’ roster is built around transfer firepower and international experience. Four players averaged at least 10.0 points per game last season: Clark at 12.7, Dasear Haskins at 11.1, Siulepa at 10.0 and Stephenson at 18.0.
Ole Miss also added 7-foot-1 Micah Handlogten, the former Sun Belt Freshman of the Year and a Florida national champion, plus 7-foot Stefan Cicic. Clark arrives with 1,513 career points and 491 assists, Stephenson put up 559 points last season at FIU - the fifth-most in a single season in program history - and Henshall brings three seasons of experience with the Perth Wildcats in Australia.
Ole Miss also signed three players for its 2026 class: Yohance Connor, Daniel Patton and Jaron Saulsberry. Patton was ranked as the 12th overall player in Texas by 247Sports, came in as a 3-star recruit and was close to the top 200 nationally.
Saulsberry, from Wheeler High School in Marietta, Georgia, is a top-10 player in his state according to ESPN and 247Sports, a 6-foot-6 four-star recruit and the No. 28 small forward in the class of 2026. Connor is rated among the best in North Carolina, listed as the No. 3 player in the state by 247Sports and No. 5 by Rivals, while ESPN and 247Sports both list him as a four-star recruit and Rivals ranks him as the No. 5 combo guard in the class of 2026.
Ole Miss also reshaped its staff this offseason, adding Petar Aleksić, Josh Baskin, Austin Cox, Anthony Fobb and Noah Stansbury.
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Auburns recent surge has made this matchup harder to ignore, especially after the Tigers knocked off Georgia and reminded the league they can still swing the conversation around the top of the SEC. If Auburn can keep winning the rest of the way, the path gets very interesting in a hurry, which is exactly why Ole Miss cannot afford to treat this as anything less than a dangerous trap game. [Read more 🡒]
Ole Miss Faces A Real Depth Test Against Auburn Again
Ole Miss heads into another Auburn matchup carrying a long injury list, and the numbers alone tell the story of how thin the margin has become. The Rebels released a report listing 15 players, with 10 already ruled out, three questionable and two probable, which puts real pressure on the rotation as the SEC grind continues. Kewan Lacy and Edwin Joseph are among the players unavailable, while Terez Davis and Jalyn Crawford remain in the questionable column.
Even so, the Rebels have been leaning into the next-man-up approach that every contender eventually has to trust. Makhi Frazier is among the backups expected to step in, and the offensive line has continued to lean on its chemistry even as injuries have changed the personnel around it. Auburn has a way of exposing any softness in the depth chart, so Ole Miss will need the same kind of plug-and-play response again if it wants to survive the evening intact. [Read more 🡒]