A typical SEC Media Days appearance involves many kinds of questions being hurled at the league’s head coaches at a rapid pace.

Most of them are football-related, but the media often tries to take the coaches away from what they know best to get their take on the hot-button issues that may only be partially related to college football.

Ole Miss coach Hugh Freeze was the final coach to take the podium in Hoover, Ala., on Thursday, and he may have had the most interesting responses of the week to some of the non-football questions.

Here are some takeaways from his appearance:

Ole Miss has a financial management team available to players

Media members tried all week to an interesting answer from coaches about the role cost-of-attendance will play in recruiting, and ultimately in the the way that players are compensated. Coach after coach gave a boring, nondescript to the question … until Freeze came along.

“We’ve already brought in a financial management team from a local bank that has been very thorough in explaining to them,” Freeze said. “We’ve broken down the exact distribution of how it’s going to work at our place and trying to give them a budget to work off of to make sure that they’re being responsible with that money that they’re given. It’s obviously a good thing for them to have that, but it also, if mismanaged, can be a bad thing. We will continue to try to educate them as to the best way to use that money.”

Well done, Coach.

Freeze thinks the Confederate flag was hijacked … maybe?

With the recent tragedy in South Carolina, there has been plenty of discussion about the merits of the Confederate flag and its place in Southern culture. The media brought Freeze into that discussion today, and his responses were interesting.

“In the early — in the late ’90s, our school made a move in a direction away from the flag,” Freeze said. “So our school has kind of made up its mind of where it’s at. I’m a Mississippian. No one understands the pride of the people of that state and the heritage of that state any better than I do. While I’m not a political figure, that symbol has been hijacked somewhat by groups that have meant ill will toward other people.”

When he was pressed a second time to explain his stance about the “hijacking” of the flag, Freeze elaborated further:

“I’m not a political figure, nor do I want to be,” he said. “I’m sure our Governor and the legislation will hear from the people. But in the world to which I live in, if something that is creating ill will in any way towards someone, it’s difficult for me to support that. As far as comparing what the original meaning meant, I’m going to have to go study some and make sure I’m speaking out of knowledge as opposed to — I know the people that I grew up around, I did not see the — them using it in ill will toward anyone, but obviously, I was raised at a much later date. I do think that it’s been associated with people that have meant some harm and ill will. I think it’s time that we move in a different direction with the state flag.”

Freeze said ‘Rebels’ nickname could be addressed if it was ‘troublesome to others’

The discussion about the Confederate flag also brought talk about the Ole Miss nickname. In recent years, the school decided to go away from its Colonel Reb mascot in favor of the black bear mascot that they use today.

“We could get into the name of the Rebels and everything, and if that’s something that is troublesome to others, I’m sure that we would address that,” Freeze said. “I haven’t heard that.”