Lane Kiffin responds to mic drop on CBS interview

Lane Kiffin cleared up the noise surrounding his popcorn comment and ensuing mic drop while talking to CBS’ Jamie Erdahl prior to kickoff of Ole Miss-Alabama.

“As you guys know I tell it like it is good and bad,” he said on Monday. “That was not premeditated. Sometimes you get caught up in emotions and I just heard something yelling in the locker room and someone’s saying that and I don’t even know why it came out and I actually said to (offensive coordinator Jeff Lebby) Lebby, I got on the headset and said ‘I said something really stupid you better score a lot of points.'”

The Ole Miss head coach also stated he didn’t mean for the end of his interview to end as abruptly as it did.

“I didn’t realize it was the last question either,” he said. “They were calling for kickoff return, there was 30 seconds on the clock and the refs were calling for it so I literally didn’t know there was another question and when I found out afterwards that that looked rude, which it did, I contacted Jamie to make sure she knew knew that was not on purpose, to apologize for that. That was not done on purpose at all. Looked like it though, I saw it.”

Prior to kickoff, Lane Kiffin stated “Here we go. Get your popcorn ready,” before tossing the headset, staring at the camera and jogging back to his team.

Ole Miss went on to lose 42-21 to Alabama, as Nick Saban’s remains undefeated against former assistants. Many expected Kiffin to give Saban and the Crimson Tide trouble after last season’s 63-48 shootout, but this time Alabama came prepared, racing out to a 28-0 halftime lead.

Alabama’s mascot, Big Al, responded to Kiffin’s comments midgame. While Alabama fans sang along to Dixieland Delight in the fourth quarter, Big Al was seen dancing in the Alabama end zone — with a large popcorn box prop around the waist of the costume.

Following the troll and subsequent loss, Kiffin is taking things in stride. The Ole Miss head coach took to Twitter to wish the Crimson Tide good luck.

“Now that’s funny! Good,” tweeted Kiffin before tagging Alabama’s Twitter account. “@AlabamaFTBL — good luck, stay healthy, and see you next year.”