It’s all business. Nothing personal, right?
Players transfer for bigger bags in this new era of college football. Coaches have always left for bigger contracts at other jobs.
In that regard, Lane Kiffin leaving Ole Miss for rival LSU wasn’t a shocker.
But wait. In this instance, Kiffin wasn’t leaving for more money. Ole Miss athletic director Keith Carter has repeatedly said that the Rebels would match any offer Kiffin had from Florida, LSU or any other suitor.
Carter has also said that Ole Miss would provide the same NIL funds to entice players to Oxford to play for Kiffin, which is why he’s enjoyed so much success in the portal over the last few years.
Kiffin didn’t leave for more cash. He left to pursue a vision that might come to fruition. He expects to pluck all the five-star recruits from New Orleans and become the fourth different LSU coach to win a national championship since 2004.
And hey, there’s a better-than-decent chance that it’ll happen. Maybe.
If it does, good for Kiffin. Good for LSU, too.
But please, spare me the Victim Card Bullshit. And since when did Kiffin start talking to God? Before he got on the jet to Red Stick at the University-Oxford Airport (where Ole Miss students gave him the business with lots of four-letter words and middle-finger salutes) yesterday, he told ESPN’s Marty Smith that, “I talked to God, and he told me it’s time to take a new step.”
I’ve seen Kiffin do hundreds of interviews through the years – from his time with the Raiders, with the Vols, at USC, at FAU and while at Ole Miss. Not once have I ever heard Kiffin break out the Religion Card, but we’ve now seen him to do it a half-dozen times since Friday’s Egg Bowl.
Kiffin reportedly picked up a “weird vibe” in his first conversation with Florida AD Scott Stricklin several weeks ago. Stricklin wanted to hire a general manager with an NFL background, and that wasn’t going to happen with Kiffin, who planned to bring Ole Miss GM Billy Glasscock with him if he left Ole Miss.
In his initial talks with LSU, the school simply wanted Kiffin. The pitch from new AD Verge Ausberry was reportedly one expressing a desire for Kiffin to just keep doing his thing, but to do at LSU on its dime.
From there, Florida was out of it. And Ole Miss was, too. Carter and the school were just hoping for a repeat of 2022 when Kiffin was as good as gone to Auburn, only to have a change of heart after his daughter Landry presented a slideshow to him with photos and memories of the good times they had shared since she arrived in Oxford.
Carter hoped that making the College Football Playoff would be enough to convince Kiffin to stay. After all, that’s not a vision for the future. That’s a reality today.
Kiffin has spent the last six seasons building for this moment. This was his team and his players he brought to Ole Miss. Surely Kiffin wasn’t going to bail with a chance to win a national title in the coming weeks?
And let’s not pretend that isn’t a very real possibility. Yes, the Ole Miss defense can be had. It’s not an elite stop unit. It’s nowhere near as stout as the 2024 Ole Miss defense.
But the Rebels can score on anybody, and they can score points galore. They’re ranked third nationally in both total yards and passing yards, and they’re 11th in scoring with their 37.3 points-per-game average.
QB Trinidad Chambliss has completed 65.5 percent of his passes for 3,016 yards with an 18/3 touchdown-to-interception ratio. He’s added 470 rushing yards and six TDs.
Kewan Lacy might be the nation’s best RB. He has 1,279 rushing yards, 20 TDs and a 5.0 yards-per-carry average.
Surely Kiffin wouldn’t walk out on these players on the cusp of something special, would he? Haven’t we been told that he’s a changed man, one who regrets the way he left Tennessee for USC?
But yes, Kiffin was poised to bail on his players before a run to the CFP. Although he clearly had made up his mind weeks ago, Kiffin informed Carter and Ole Miss Chancellor Glenn Boyce on Saturday that he was going to take the LSU job.
In an attempt to save face, Kiffin pushed hard for Carter to let him to continue to coach in the CFP. That was never going to happen, though.
Nor should it!
Kiffin reportedly told Carter and Boyce that if he couldn’t coach the Rebels in the CFP, he was going to take his offensive coaches to LSU with him on Sunday.
In other words, he wasn’t just leaving his team bound for the CFP. No, he was going to take his entire offensive staff with him and leave his players without coaches, purposely sabotaging the best team in program history.
In fact, Kiffin reportedly told his offensive coaches that he had jobs for them at LSU, but only if they were on the plane with him Sunday to Baton Rouge.
When that news made its way to players, several of them reportedly confronted Kiffin in his office on Sunday. Per John Talty of CBS Sports, Kiffin refused to directly answer the questions from his players.
“I’m not making them go,” Kiffin told the players. “They can do whatever they want.”
Kiffin continued to push Carter on Sunday to allow him to coach in the CFP, but the reality at that point was that the vast majority of players wanted him gone.
Finally, when he was informed that defensive coordinator Pete Golding had been named as the new permanent head coach, he accepted his fate – and started playing the Victim Card with a statement he released and in his interview with Smith and his little-league, slow-pitch softball questions.
As usual, it was all about Lane. Never mind his players that are being left behind. Kiffin also took OC Charlie Weis Jr., co-OC Joe Cox, his brother Chris Kiffin and WRs coach George McDonald with him to LSU.
Again, they weren’t given the option to join him at LSU if they remained at Ole Miss through the CFP. Again, Lane’s always gonna Lane.
As for Golding, if a report from Neal McCready is true, his tenure is off to a fabulous start with the Ole Miss fan base.
Per McCready, while the Ole Miss staff was watching the second half of the Iron Bowl on Saturday night at the Manning Center to see if Auburn would upset Alabama (and send the Rebels to the SEC Championship Game for a rematch against Georgia), Golding said to Kiffin, “Why don’t you take your ass home to watch the rest of that? This isn’t your office anymore.”
Although it’s unprecedented for a coach to walk out on his team in the CFP era of college football, college basketball had a similar situation in Ann Arbor in the spring of 1989. Michigan head basketball coach Bill Frieder was accepting an offer to become the next HC at Arizona St. even though he had the Wolverines on their way to a fifth consecutive NCAA Tournament appearance after going 24-7.
He had led Michigan to the Sweet 16 in the 1988 NCAA Tournament. Michigan had studs galore like Loy Vaught, Terry Mills, Rumeal Robinson, Sean Higgins and Glen Rice.
ASU hadn’t tasted an NCAA Tournament invite since 1981. Why Frieder would leave Michigan for ASU was a head scratcher.
When Frieder informed Michigan AD Bo Schembechler of his intentions, he expressed a desire to stay on and coach the Wolverines in the NCAA Tournament.
Schembechler denied the request and named assistant Steve Fisher as the interim head coach. When asked about it by media members, Schembechler boldly stated, “A Michigan man is going to coach a Michigan team.”
Fisher then led the Wolverines to the Final Four, where they beat Illinois to make the finals. In overtime against Seton Hall in the finals at the old Kingdome in Seattle, Robinson hit a pair of game-winning free throws in the final seconds to secure an 80-79 victory.
Whether Golden can pull off a similar accomplishment remains to be seen. Ole Miss is likely going to host a home game on Dec. 19 or Dec. 20.
Despite what an E-60 documentary on ESPN told us in October, Kiffin hasn’t changed. He may go to hot yoga every morning and refrain from cold beers these days, but he’s still a Drama Queen that’s all about himself.
When you hire Kiffin, you hire everything that comes with him. That includes lots of wins, brilliant ball plays, TDs galore, fun pressers, confusing tweets and a soap-opera-like environment.
But like John Calipari’s tenures at UMass, Memphis and Kentucky, it never ends well. It ends with hurt feelings, broken relationships and general disgust.
LSU doesn’t care about any of that right now. Nor should it. But if Alabama and Kalen DeBoer get a divorce in 3-4 years or if the New York Giants come calling after signing QB Jaxson Dart to a long-term extension sometime down the road, LSU could get a dose of its own medicine.
If the Tigers get another natty on Kiffin’s watch, it’ll all be worth it. If not, all the smiles and celebration we saw in Red Stick last night will be a distant memory.
And Lane will be on a plane to his next stop.