Matt Corral "Flying Around" at Practices, Shaking off Tough Outing
Matt Corral is elastic. You have to be in order to move forward after a week like the Ole Miss quarterback had this past Saturday in Fayetteville.
It's an old football trope: quarterbacks have to have short memories. That can be within a game, bouncing back from a bad decision to lead a touchdown drive, or it can be game-to-game. Corral, after a six interception game this past week against Arkansas, is looking for that elastic bounce back going into this week's Auburn game.
According to everyone at Ole Miss practices over the past few days, you'd have no idea the Rebel signal-caller was is coming off the worst performance of his life.
It seems to be business as usual in Oxford.
"It's just like everything else in life. Once you fail, you have one of two choices: either you can keep going or you can stop and quit," said running back Jerrion Ealy. "Matt's not a quitter. He's come out here and been his own self. He's out here flying around and laughing and smiling every day. He's not too worried about what happened in the past. It was a learning question and a stepping stone."
(More: What Happened With Matt Corral and the Ole Miss Offense vs. Arkansas?)
Head coach Lane Kiffin told media on Monday that it took Corral a good 24 hours after last week's game to get back to even-keel. Kiffin gave the team the day off on Sunday, saying Corral was having a "rough day. It sucked." But you can't let one game beat you twice, and Kiffin iterated Ealy's comments about the Monday practices, saying his quarterback was "good, upbeat."
Corral is going to need to be better. A lot has been discussed about the way Arkansas spent all of last week's game dropping eight into coverage, leading Matt Corral to force the ball into tighter windows. And this week doesn't get much easier.
While this Auburn team coming to town is struggling in their own right, many of their struggles come on the offensive side. The Auburn defense, coming off a loss where they held South Carolina under 300 total yards, is ranked No. 22 nationally by SP+ efficiency.
It's not an easy bounce-back opportunity. But it's one nonetheless.
"Matt's positive, shaking it off. He's taking it game-by-game, week by week. It's no problem, we're going to bounce back," said receiver Elijah Moore. "It's not just Matt; it was the whole team, the whole group. We didn't do what we needed to do to get it done. That's in the past now and we're moving on."
More From The Grove Report:
Everything Auburn Head Coach Gus Malzahn is Saying about Ole Miss and Lane Kiffin
How Will Ole Miss Attack Defenses That Emulate the Arkansas Plan?
You can join The Grove Report community by clicking "Follow" on the top righthand corner of the page or under the three bars on the top left in mobile. Also, be sure to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter @SIRebels and @nategabler.
