ATLANTA – Don’t let the smile that always seems to be gracing his face or the relative lack of offseason chatter about him fool you. Ole Miss junior wide receiver Cayden Lee is an established force.
Lee was a three-star member of the Rebels’ 2023 class, a group that included four-star receiver Ayden Williams from Ridgeland and highly touted transfer wide receivers Tre Harris and Zakhari Franklin. Ole Miss also already had Jordan Watkins and Dayton Wade on the roster when Lee joined the program out of Kennesaw, Georgia.
Lee caught five passes for 114 yards as a true freshman – he started the Rebels’ Peach Bowl win over Penn State – and broke out as a sophomore with 57 grabs for 874 yards and two touchdowns. His 874 yards in 2024 are third-most among returning SEC players and, according to Pro Football Focus, Lee has not dropped a single pass in his two seasons with the Rebels. He finished third on the Rebels in receiving last season behind Harris and Watkins, both of whom were NFL Draft picks.
Still, Lee is not a preseason All-SEC first or second-team pick by most major publications, although he did garner third-team honors from Athlon and Phil Steele.
“I’m not going to boost his ego, he’s probably going to hear this later. He was laughing when I first walked in,” redshirt sophomore quarterback Austin Simmons said with a laugh. “ … I would definitely say (he’s still underrated), him having that underdog mindset.”
As one of the Rebels’ three representatives at 2025 SEC Media Days with Simmons and junior linebacker TJ Dottery, Lee sat at a table Monday flanked with reporters on all sides and answered questions that ran the gamut. When asked whether he thought he was still underrated, Lee pondered for a moment, grinned and let the college football world know their opinions on him really didn’t matter.
“I like the term ‘Silent Assassin.’ I don’t really need to be talked about too much,” Lee said. “I’m just going to go out and do my job, whether people talk about me or not. I just control what I can control.”
Ole Miss brought in former South Carolina star receiver Antwane “Juice” Wells Jr. last offseason and added a handful of premier receivers from the transfer portal this year, including former Oklahoma State star De’Zhaun Stribling, former Penn State starter Harrison Wallace III, former West Virginia receiver Traylon Ray, former Wake Forest receiver Deuce Alexander and former Alabama receiver Caleb Odom. The Rebels also added five-star receiver Caleb Cunningham, the No. 32 player nationally in 247Sports’ Composite.
But as has always been the case, whether he was competing for snaps with Williams, Wells or whoever it may be, Lee continues to stay the course and produce with the Rebels. He knows playing receiver at Ole Miss is about as good of an opportunity as there is in college football these days.
Ole Miss has had two receivers with 500 or more yards in each of head coach Lane Kiffin’s five previous seasons, including three with at least 700 yards in each of the last two years.
“I mean, why would you not want to play for coach Kiffin?” Lee said. “It’s a receiver school, and he’s always going to find a way to just get the ball in the receiver’s hands, and that’s a big reason.”
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