Carrying the mometum from a record-breaking season last season, the Ole Miss Rebels opened the 2025-2026 season inside the friendly confines of the Pavilion as they welcomed the Lions of Southeastern Louisiana to Oxford for the season opener. 

After last Sunday’s preseason loss to Saint Mary’s, the Rebels were looking for a tune-up against the Lions as Coach Beard and his staff aim to figure out what will make Ole Miss successful now while building the lineups for championships in March. Ole Miss would come into the game with Southeastern Louisiana looking to avoid an early disaster upset, but instead use the opportunity at hand to improve and build for harder matchups in the future.  

Despite a slow start by the Rebels, Ole Miss was able to ride the choppy waves into the break, taking a 45-29 lead over the Lions to the locker room. Ole Miss finished the first half, making six out of the last seven shots. Malik Dia and Aj Storr led the way in scoring for the Rebels in the first half with ten points each, while Ilias Kamardine finished the half with nine points of his own. 

Ole Miss started the second half strong and never looked back. Racing out to a twenty-point, 51-31 over the Lions at the under-16 timeout, it was evident the second half would belong to Coach Beard and the Ole Miss Rebels. At the under-8 media timeout of the second half, the Rebels had extended the lead over SELA to 71-46 with 7:56 remaining in the game. At the final media timeout of the game, the Rebels still held a 78-54 lead over the Lions. Ole Miss extended the lead to thirty as the Rebels earned an 88-58 opening night victory. 

Malik Dia finished his night as the leading scorer for the Rebels with 20 points, Aj Storr finished with 18, while Ilias Kamardine finished his night with 13 points. 

It wasn’t pretty by any means, but a win is a win, and the Rebels showed improvement from half to half and earned a hard-fought opening night win over a scrappy program. As we saw in the preseason, you don’t quite figure out all the small details in practice; game experience is the greatest tool for programs like Ole Miss to use in building for March. As much as some like to deny it, every basketball team in the country uses each night on the hardwood as a primer for March Madness; that’s the end goal to win championships, either conference tournaments or the whole thing. All that matters is hanging banners, and Monday night was just the start of the journey towards bringing a championship home to Oxford. 

Ole Miss will return to action on Friday night as they welcomes Louisiana Monroe to Oxford for a Southeastern Conference and Sun Belt showdown. 

Photo credits- Ole Miss Basketball on X