LSU Coach Lane Kiffin Takes Yet Another Pointed Dig At Ole Miss

Lane Kiffin keeps stirring up the drama even though it has been sixth months since he left Ole Miss for LSU while the Rebels were gearing up to compete in the College Football Playoff.

He has become more blunt when talking about the Rebels, who ended up losing in the semifinals to Miami 31-27, and kept it going when talking about their playoff run.

Though Kiffin wanted to coach Ole Miss in the playoff despite taking the LSU job, the Rebels did not let him stay—even though they let his assistants, who would soon join him in Baton Rouge, stay and coach in the postseason.

He thinks that the season would have ended differently had he gotten his wish.

Kiffin keeps up the Ole Miss conversations

Lane Kiffin crouches while coaching a game for Ole Miss in 2025 | Matt Bush / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Kiffin doesn't even see it as a question when considering if Ole Miss would have made the national championship if he was still the coach, he said in an interview with USA Today.

“If anyone wants to argue that theory, that if everything is kept intact, we’re not in the national championship, what are you going to argue?” Kiffin said.

Ole Miss promoted defensive coordinator Pete Golding to head coach after Kiffin's departure. Kiffin knows Ole Miss would have made it further with himself still at the helm.

“[Golding] knows he calls it way better up [in the booth],” Kiffin said, “especially when you’ve been up there all year, you know?”

Kiffin is slighting Golding, a native of Hammond, La. who has never had a head coaching job before having to lead the Rebels in the playoff, and challenging his coaching ability.

The two will be able to figure out their differences when Ole Miss and LSU meet in Oxford, Miss. on Sept. 19, but it is interesting how Kiffin won't drop the topic of his former team.

Kiffin, as well as Ole Miss, knows that the rebels would have been more successful if it let him coach the playoff. But with such a rocky exit to a conference rival, the Rebels didn't have much of a choice, even if Kiffin won't see it that way.

And since he wasn't allowed to, he is telling Ole Miss what it already knows to remind them of what he sees as a poor choice.

“[If] Pete Golding is in the press box calling the defense, that team is in the national championship,” Kiffin said. “I don’t know what happens against Indiana, because the quarterback, [Fernando Mendoza], is so good. We might win it, but we’re definitely in it. We ain’t losing to Miami.”

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