[4] After university officials attempted to paint Freeze's predecessor as the main culprit, they were sued for defamation and they subsequently issued a public apology.

[5] The team's star quarterback and other players told NCAA officials that Freeze lied to them about the charges while he recruited them.

[6] Freeze resigned from Ole Miss in 2017 after officials discovered that he had used a university cellphone to call escort services at least a dozen times over 33 months.

[11][12][10] Freeze then attended the University of Southern Mississippi, where he tried out for the baseball team in the fall of 1990, hoping to make the roster for the spring of 1991.

[13] He graduated from Southern Miss in 1992 with a Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics and a minor in coaching and sports administration.

[14] In 1992, Freeze joined the staff at Briarcrest Christian School in Memphis, Tennessee, as the football team's offensive coordinator and defensive backs coach.

[16] Freeze was depicted in the book and motion picture The Blind Side, about one of his former players, offensive tackle Michael Oher.

[14] After that season, he replaced head coach Ed Orgeron on an interim basis before the hiring of Houston Nutt.

In January 2008, Lambuth University, a member of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), named Freeze its head coach.

[24] In 2011, his only season as head coach at Arkansas State, he led the Red Wolves to a 10–2 record and their first Sun Belt Conference title since 2005.

An investigation turned up evidence that Ole Miss employees and boosters arranged numerous "impermissible benefits" for players, such as car loans and cash.

[42] Ole Miss officials began calling reporters, telling them falsely that most of the alleged violations had taken place under Freeze's predecessor Houston Nutt.

[43] The investigation reopened soon after star offensive tackle Laremy Tunsil admitted taking money from one of Freeze's assistants.

After the charges became public, these players sought to transfer to other schools; each requested and received a waiver to the NCAA rule that would have prevented them from playing for a year.

[6][46][47] On July 13, 2017, Nutt sued Ole Miss for defamation, contending that Freeze and school officials had "conspired to smear him" with false claims about the charges.

[5][50] As part of discovery for the lawsuit, Nutt's attorneys filed a freedom-of-information request for calls Freeze made on his university-issued cell phone during January 2016.

While reviewing those records, Nutt's attorneys discovered a call to a number associated with a female escort service, and alerted Ole Miss officials about it.

[27] On July 20, 2017, chancellor Jeff Vitter and athletic director Ross Bjork gave Freeze an ultimatum: resign or be fired for violating the morals clause of his contract.

[8] In February 2019, the NCAA punished the Ole Miss football team for the recruiting and academic violations committed under both Nutt and Freeze.

[4] On October 11, 2018, Freeze was offered a job as offensive coordinator of the Arizona Hotshots of the Alliance of American Football league; he turned it down.

[62] In January and July 2022, Freeze sent multiple unsolicited direct messages on Twitter to Chelsea Andrews, a former student at Liberty.

[72][73] In 2018, the Baptist Press described him as "a regular speaker at churches and conferences whose Twitter account is filled with Christian references.

"[74] After he was forced to resign from Ole Miss for his calls to escort services, "he faced scrutiny and criticism not only as a rising star in the coaching world, but as a high profile evangelical Christian, too," wrote the Tennessean.