Skip to main content
Join
Team Avatar
Ole Miss

Lane Kiffin masterfully trolls coaching carousel speculation on job status

photos -jpgby:Ashton Pollard•12/09/21•

ashtonpollard7

lane-kiffin-trolls-coaching-carousel-speculation-job-status-vanderbilt-commordores
Chris McDill/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

Head coach Lane Kiffin just signed a massive contract extension with Ole Miss, but new deals don’t stop the coaching carousel rumors in college football. Even if they are facetious. 

Kiffin had recently tweeted photos from Nashville, home of the Vanderbilt Commodores, and Bainbridge Air Base in Georgia. William Bainbridge, a former United States Navy Commodore, is the namesake of the military base. 

In a light-hearted manner, the always-clever Reddit College Football Twitter account tried to put the pieces together. Is Kiffin leaving Oxford to take over the reins at Vanderbilt? Unsurprisingly, Kiffin took to Twitter himself to participate in the banter.

Ole Miss plays at Vanderbilt on Oct. 8, so Kiffin will in fact “go to Vandy” in the near future. It will be the Rebels second conference game of 2022, as they start with Troy, Central Arkansas, Georgia Tech and Tulsa before taking on Kentucky on Oct. 1.

Kiffin beat first-year Vanderbilt head coach Clark Lea 31-17 in this year’s game.

Rebels return to Sugar Bowl

Since both Alabama and Georgia made the College Football Playoff, Kiffin’s team earned a spot in the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans. They will face Baylor on Jan. 1 with a chance to win 11 games for the first time in school history. Ole Miss last played in the Sugar Bowl following the 2015 season, defeating Oklahoma State 48-20 under then-head coach Hugh Freeze.

The game is particularly intriguing given Kiffin’s offensive expertise paired up with Baylor head coach Dave Aranda’s masterful defensive mind. Ole Miss led the SEC in yards per game this season with 506.7, their second year over 500 yards of offense. Of course, it is also Kiffin’s second year.

However, it’s not all good news out of Oxford. The Rebels will play the game without offensive coordinator Jeff Lebby, as he departed to take the same job at Oklahoma on Wednesday.

Aranda is in his second year in Waco as well and orchestrated one of the biggest comeback seasons in college football; Baylor went 2-7 last year, and this season they are 11-2 and won a Big 12 title. In 2020, the Bears gave up 29.2 points per game. That number dropped to 19.2 in 2021. 

Early odds favor the Bears by 1.5 points. The over/under is just 54 points, the lowest O/U for the Rebels this season.