Bruce Feldman explains placing Lane Kiffin at No. 21 in his ranking of CFB's Top 25 head coaches

Bruce Feldman of The Athletic has recently released his list of the Top 25 coaches in the country. Within that list, there were plenty of interesting nuggets. However, one of the most interesting ones was his decision to rank Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin at 21st in the country.

While making an appearance on The Paul Finebaum Show, Feldman explained his decision to rank Kiffin at 21st, comparing him to Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian.

“I think he’s done a really good job and, like Sark, I think he’s grown quite a bit from earlier in his career,” Bruce Feldman said. “I think after this year, that team is loaded. They’ve got a really strong NIL operation there around Ole Miss, and I think they have a chance to make a run at, and making the 12-team Playoff isn’t as meaningful as making a four-team Playoff, but I think they have a chance to make a run at being a legit national title contender.”

Essentially, Feldman made the argument that Kiffin has been good, but not good enough against the best competition in the country. That put him lower on the list than most people would have expected.

“But, big picture wise, he’s 7-8 against top-25 teams since taking over in Oxford. That’s not terrible, but that’s not great,” Feldman said of Kiffin. “I think he is a guy who if you look at his record against top-10 teams, he’s 3-15. So, again, he’s grown and gotten better and I think Ole Miss has gotten the best version of where he’s been, but just taking the whole picture in opposed to maybe the last couple of years, that’s why I didn’t have him higher than where I had him.

“Again, it’s hard on this list to keep it to 25 just because you look at some of the coaches around him, they’re some really good coaches as well,” Feldman added.

Lane Kiffin is going into his fifth season at Ole Miss, where he has compiled a 34-15 record with two Top-25 finishes. Ole Miss is also coming off a New Year’s Six win in the Peach Bowl.

Prior to that, Kiffin was the head coach at FAU. He also spent time as the head coach at USC and Tennessee, with a brief stint in the NFL, coaching the Oakland Raiders. On top of that, he’s been one of the best offensive assistants in the country under Nick Saban and Pete Carroll.

Kiffin’s overall head coaching record in college is 95-49. He went 5-15 in the NFL.