‘Coach (Kiffin) came into my life for a reason’: Ole Miss’ Hess has traded in his fire extinguisher for recruiting film

Jonathan Hess was in 9th grade the last time Ole Miss beat Alabama in football.

The Rebels, in 2015, picked up just their second win ever in Tuscaloosa. Hess was a blossoming soon-to-be three-star tight end recruit from nearby Birmingham. He was also born and raised a Crimson Tide fan. 

Alabama, historically, has dominated Ole Miss. The Rebels to this day still only have 10 all-time wins in a series that dates back to 1894. 

However, on that fateful September day over seven years ago, Ole Miss was the better team. The Rebels were ranked No. 15 in the country, while Alabama was No. 2. Ole Miss used a legendary performance from quarterback Chad Kelly (18 for 33, 341 yards and three touchdowns) and a handful of others to pull out a 43-37 win.

Rare as the win was, Hess remembers it for reasons far beyond the final score. Ole Miss, he recalls years later, ‘had the juice.’

Alabama, meanwhile, was lacking. 

“I would look down and I saw the Ole Miss sideline — everybody jumping up with towels and going crazy,” Hess told the Ole Miss Spirit this week. “I looked across the field and ‘Bama’s on the ropes looking all scared.”

Then-Ole Miss head coach Hugh Freeze offered him a few years later.

Hess committed on the spot. Yes, the game left that much of a lasting impression. 

Granted, he didn’t have the Ole Miss career he hoped for. Hess moved from offense to defense and back to offense, finishing up as a reserve tight end with a combined 11 games played his last two seasons.

Injury proved the primarily culprit.

Ole Miss, though, taught him something in Tuscaloosa — a lesson he continues to hold onto all these years later. Even if he wasn’t playing, Hess could impact games, specifically on the sideline. It was Hess who popularized Ole Miss spraying a fire extinguisher on the sideline after big plays the last few seasons.

“Everyone on the team loved it,” Hess said. “It kind of became a thing. It was goofy of me, but everybody on the team loved it, and the energy on the sideline would be great after it. 

“If the sideline’s got juice, you’re usually playing pretty well and it can carry over.”

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Hess will continue to bring the juice for Ole Miss football, only now in an off-the-field role.

He was hired two weeks ago as a recruiting analyst. He’s traded in his helmet and shoulder pads for mountains of highlight tapes of 2024, 2025 and 2026 recruits.

The career move was born of a one-on-one meeting with Kiffin. Hess was done as a player, but he wanted to continue to give back to Ole Miss. 

“To serve the program and give back to the institution that gave me so much,” he said.

Kiffin told him about a bottom-of-the-ladder position in the recruiting office. Kiffin — who led Hess and the Rebels to an 8-5 record in 2022, including the team’s third straight bowl appearance — saw Hess as a perfect fit.

“He’s the reason I wanted to get into coaching,” Hess said of Kiffin. “I saw the way he ran the program, and it really inspired me to hopefully try and be like that some day.”

“Now I just want to get the best players for him. I feel like this is my calling. I’m right where I’m supposed to be, and everything happens for a reason. Coach came into my life for a reason.”

Hess isn’t retiring the fire extinguisher. 

Even if he, himself, can no longer carry it, Hess hopes one of his remaining Ole Miss teammates picks up the tradition that caught on like wildfire with Rebel fans and national and local media.

Hess sounds like the coach he is now when he talks about it. See, while some might have saw a goofy, attention-grabbing sideline stunt, Hess was playing his role for a success-starved program striving for something more. 

Kiffin has ushered in unprecedented, modern-day and consistent winning at Ole Miss. It was Hess and Kiffin, together, that came up with the fire extinguisher idea. Kiffin approached him at practice. He thought Ole Miss needed a smoke machine for the sideline. 

They debuted the smoke-filled extinguisher in Death Valley (LSU).

“I was like, ‘Coach, that’d look so cool on TV. Recruits will see that,’” Hess said. 

Hess was already a recruiter and didn’t even know it.

“I’m really interested to see who picks it up now,” Hess said. “Hopefully people will humble themselves to know, ‘Hey, I can be that guy this year and it’s going to be OK. I’m going to be the fire-extinguisher guy.’ ‘Cause, to me, that was no problem. I knew my role. We’ve got to bring that juice no matter what.

“Another reason I really wanted to stay at Ole Miss is because not only does the program sell itself, and I’ve told a lot of people this, even when I was hosting (recruits) on their official visits as a player, but it’s not hard to recruit somebody to play for coach Kiffin. I wouldn’t want to play football again for anyone else but coach Kiffin. I’ve seen how much fun and competitive it can be. 

“Having fun and winning ballgames is not mutually exclusive. You can get good work done, have fun and still go whoop somebody every weekend. That’s what I learned.”