It came as no surprise whatsoever Tuesday night when Ole Miss Rebel Trinidad Chambliss stepped to the podium to a standing ovation to receive the C Spire Conerly Trophy as Mississippi’s  most outstanding college football player.

No, the bigger surprise is that Chambliss, a dynamic quarterback largely responsible for the Rebels 11-1 season and coming NCAA playoffs berth, has for the most part been omitted from the lists of viable candidates for the Heisman Trophy, the one that goes to the best college football player in America. I can’t say for certain Chambliss is the best in the country, but I know he belongs in the first sentence of any 2025 Heisman discussion. I know he deserves to go to New York as one of the finalists for the ceremony on Dec. 13.

The Heisman Trophy Trust normally invites four finalists to the New York Downtown Athletic Club for the presentation. I haven’t seen a prediction yet that expects Chambliss to be there.

On3, the network of sports websites, recently published a poll of college football experts around the country that had Vanderbilt quarterback Diego Pavia leading the list of likely Heisman winners, followed, in order, by Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza, Ohio State quarterback Justin Sayin, Notre Dame running back Jeremiyah Love and Alabama quarterback Tyler Simpson. In sixth place, with far fewer votes than the top four, was Chambliss.

Pavia, the leader (and a great player), has completed 71% of his passes for 3,192 yards and run for 826 yards and nine touchdown. He has thrown 27 touchdowns and eight interceptions. Chambliss has completed 66% of his passes for 3,016 yards and run for 470 yards and six touchdowns. He has thrown for 18 touchdowns, only three interceptions. He seems at his best when it matters most. He makes plays when there doesn’t seem one there.

The individual stats are quite similar, especially when you consider Chambliss didn’t start the Rebels first two games and largely missed the opportunity to pad his stats against Georgia State and Kentucky. Chambliss’s numbers are as good or at least slightly better than those of the other three quarterbacks ahead of him.

Most Heisman voters are sports writers and sportscasters who presumably love a good story. There is no better story in college football than Chambliss, unless its Pavia (Vanderbilt? 10-2!). Last year, Chambliss led Division II Ferris State to the Division II National Championship and transferred to Ole Miss only after assistant coaches Joe Judge and Charlie Weiss Jr. saw some Ferris State tape on him last spring and couldn’t believe what they were watching.

Said Judge, who accompanied Chambliss to the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame Museum Tuesday night, “The more we watched, the more impressed we were. He was clearly a great athlete. You couldn’t tell from that tape whether he was an SEC-caliber quarterback, but we knew he was a guy with the ability to help us win as a slot receiver or a punt returner.”

Turns out, Chambliss was a quarterback deluxe. As Judge, the former New York Giants head coach, put it, “Trinidad has impacted our team both on and off the field. He’s great in the locker room. His teammates love him and believe in him. In my career, I have been around a lot of great football players and I can tell you with absolute certainty he is one. I don’t have a Heisman vote, obviously, but I can tell you Trinidad Chambliss is without question one of the best college football players in America.”

Patrick Kutas, the mammoth Ole Miss junior offensive tackle who Tuesday night took home the Kent Hull Trophy as the state’s most outstanding offensive lineman, says he didn’t know what to expect when learning that Ole Miss had signed a Division II quarterback in the transfer portal.

“The first thing you saw was the competitiveness in him,” Kutas said. “Trinidad is the ultimate competitor. He’s been fantastic all season long. He 100% deserves to be in the Heisman race.”

One strike against Chambliss – strange as it sounds – might be that he came to Ole Miss from Division II. The thinking: How can anybody who wasn’t even recruited by a DI school be the best player in America?

Said Chambliss Tuesday night, “There are great players at every level of college football.” 

Myriad examples exist, including a Super Bowl hero named Malcolm Butler, from Vicksburg, Hinds Community College and the University of West Alabama, and former Pro Bowler Fred McAfee, from Philadelphia (the one in Mississippi) and Mississippi College. For the record, 40 former Division II players currently play in the NFL.

Said Chambliss of his storybook season and the Conerly Trophy, “This is all a dream come true for me. I am blessed.”

Asked about the Heisman Trophy, Chambliss smiled and mentioned that not starting those first two games probably hurt his chances but that, “I really do feel like I am one of the best players in college football. I really do.”

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The Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame instituted two new college football awards Tuesday night:

• Jackson State quarterback Jacobian Morgan won the SWAC Impact Award as the state’s top player in the Southwestern Athletic Conference.
• Delta State linebacker William Carter IV won the DII DIII Excellence Award as the most outstanding player in Divisions II and III.