Why Ole Miss could not get to Oklahoma: a timed-out crew, a small airport and nobody left to fly the plane

Ole Miss sent its players home Friday afternoon and told them to return to the football facility that evening for updates. By the end of the night, the school said, the Rebels had an airplane but no flight crew legally permitted to fly it. The team could not leave for Oklahoma until 4:20 p.m. CT Saturday, a full day after a nationwide groundstop froze air travel across the country.

The Federal Aviation Administration issued the groundstop shortly before 3 p.m. CT Friday and lifted it at 7:15 p.m. CT, more than four hours later. It was only the third full groundstop in the country's history, and it scrambled travel for college football programs across the nation.

SEC commissioner Greg Sankey ultimately moved the Ole Miss at Oklahoma game from Saturday to Sunday, a decision that sparked a fight between the Sooners and the conference. Oklahoma pushed to keep the game on Saturday, but Sankey told the school that failing to play at the directed time would result in a forfeit. Sunday's kickoff is set for 1 p.m. ET (Noon CT) on the SEC Network.

"Put simply, this decision isn't fair to our athletes, our institution or to Sooner Nation," Oklahoma athletic director Roger Denny said in a statement released early Saturday. "But we've been given no other choice." Denny added: "We were told that Ole Miss explored every avenue to travel to Norman and play on Saturday as planned. But, unlike every other team traveling for competition tomorrow, they were unable to find a solution."

Ole Miss described its problem as purely logistical. The Rebels faced a 55-minute bus ride from campus in Oxford to Tupelo Regional Airport, a facility that handles little scheduled commercial traffic. After the groundstop, the school's charter broker, Air Planning, informed Ole Miss that JetBlue could not fly the team to Oklahoma City on Friday night. The flight crew would have exceeded its assigned duty time before departure, the school said, and because Tupelo is not a JetBlue hub, no relief crew was available to operate the charter, sources told CBS Sports. The Tupelo airport did not handle any arrivals or departures when the groundstop ended Friday night.

"There were no other flight options at that point, and we determined it was too late to put our student-athletes on a bus trip of eight or more hours," Ole Miss said in a statement released Saturday afternoon, nearly an hour after its originally scheduled kickoff time. "In addition, the flight crew's duty time restrictions prevented us from being able to fly out until Saturday afternoon at the earliest." Flight crews are required to have at least 10 hours of rest between shifts. The school maintained that "the goal was always to fly to Norman Friday night and play the game Saturday."

Former Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops was unmoved. "This decision by Greg Sankey is absolutely wrong," Stoops wrote on social media Saturday. "All of the Power Four teams found a way to make it to their games, but Ole Miss wouldn't?" Every other FBS team affected by the groundstop rescheduled flights or traveled by bus Friday or Saturday, producing about half a dozen adjusted kickoff times. Arizona did not fly until Saturday morning and landed five hours before its 5:30 p.m. ET kickoff at UCF. Auburn left an airport and booked buses for a four-hour trip to Starkville, Mississippi, with its game at Mississippi State moved to 3:15 p.m. CT. No. 2 Utah's game at No. 23 Arizona was pushed to 10:30 p.m. ET after the Utes could not leave Salt Lake City until 10 a.m. MT Saturday.

Oklahoma also voiced concern for its supporters. "Those who have made travel arrangements, accommodations and personal plans around a Saturday game now face unnecessary disruption and hardship," Denny said. The school is offering discounted concessions, including $2 hot dogs and beer, along with complimentary tickets to other athletic events to draw fans to the rescheduled game.

The stakes remain significant for both programs. Oklahoma (5-4, 4-4 SEC) is coming off a 23-7 win at Florida in Jason Witten's first game as interim offensive coordinator and needs one more victory to reach bowl eligibility. Ole Miss (6-3) fell to No. 19 in the College Football Playoff rankings after a 42-7 home loss to now-No. 1 Georgia, but the Rebels remain technically alive in the CFP race.