Ole Miss has always been a beautiful campus and Oxford is a nice safe place to live, which is relevant because parents love that. The problem in the past is that the program was a veritable shitshow from the AD perspective, the team didn't win enough, and other negative stereotypes were the accepted narrative. You couldn't get the major recruits to even visit campus. When Ole Miss was lucky enough to get a bigger recruit to actually visit, you would always here the same quotes "I only heard bad things before the visit", or "I was shocked how nice it was", etc. Perception has held down the program.

Over the last 10 years or so, Ole Miss has boosted its facilities to compete with the league (nice IPF, student athlete center, training table, etc). The Ole Miss brand is stronger than ever and nationally relevant for the first time since the 70s. They have a dynamic HC and AD that know how to market the program to its strengths. Freeze doesn't subscribe to the former groupthink that you can't recruit national players to a remote school located in MS, and he certainly DGAF about going big in recruiting. Obviously his coaching staff and support staff have can promote a high-powered, fun and creative offense paired with an aggressive defense, which recruits want to play in.

TL:DR - here's the only answer the SECr wants: