Pete Golding says Trinidad Chambliss set precedent at Ole Miss that will be ‘hard to match’
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From the moment Trinidad Chambliss — “a D2 boy,” as Pete Golding affectionately called him — arrived on campus, the Ole Miss head coach had a soft spot for him.
Yes, Golding had a different kind of interaction with Chambliss at the beginning of the season, when he was just the defensive coordinator and not running the show, but Golding said Chambliss’s impact on the team was immediately felt.
“When he first got here, you didn’t even hear him. You just saw him. And you saw him with his head down, working his ass off,” Golding said Thursday night after the Fiesta Bowl. “Then you started seeing people gravitating to him and they wanted to be around him.”
Chambliss threw for 277 yards and a touchdown in Thursday night’s 31-27 loss to Miami. The result knocked Ole Miss out of the College Football Playoff — 1 game shy of the national championship — and potentially ended Chambliss’s career.
He transferred to Ole Miss last offseason with just 1 guaranteed season of eligibility remaining. And he did so knowing that Austin Simmons was projected to be the starting quarterback.
“For a guy like that to come with 1 year into the SEC, with an offense that was already in place, with a guy that had already signed to be the franchise guy, it just showed his confidence in himself,” Golding said.
And that confidence was on full display during fall camp, when Chambliss had Golding pulling his hair out in practice.
“In fall camp, the 1 defense goes against the 2 offense when he’s running with the 2s and, shit, we couldn’t stop his ass,” Golding said. “I knew if something was going to happen to Austin, we were in pretty good hands.”
Something did eventually happen to Simmons, of course. He was injured in the second game of the season. Chambliss took the reins for the Arkansas game and never gave the job back.
Chambliss has already agreed to a deal to return to Ole Miss next season, presuming he’s eligible. He has filed a medical redshirt waiver for a sixth year of eligibility and is awaiting a final determination from the NCAA on that waiver.
“It’s just awesome to see good things happen to good people,” Golding said. “For him to take a chance, to come here with a guy in place, and for it to work out the way it did for him, I couldn’t be happier. He’s kind of set a precedent here within 1 year that’s gonna be pretty hard to match.”
Derek Peterson does a bit of everything, not unlike Taysom Hill. He has covered Oklahoma, Nebraska, the Pac-12, and now delivers CFB-wide content.
