Kiffin details Ole Miss’ ‘very strange path’ to every-year-contender status
Not until Lane Kiffin showed up had Ole Miss football won 10 games in a regular season.
The Rebels have now done so twice.
But how they got here — ranked near the Top 10, and sitting 10-2 (6-2 SEC) at the end of the 2023 regular season and after a 17-7 win over Mississippi State in the Egg Bowl — has been far from a straight path.
Every-year, near-wholesale change has been a recurring theme over Kiffin’s four-season Ole Miss tenure. Myriad high-profile players have come and gone. Same for assistant coaches, including multiple coordinators.
And yet, Ole Miss has never been more consistent, or competitive, in the modern era. Kiffin’s the second-fastest Ole Miss head coach to 30 wins and just the second Rebel coach to chart multiple 10-win seasons.
Johnny Vaught, the Ole Miss coaching GOAT (greatest of all-time), is the other.
“I don’t think any of that could have been predicted,” Kiffin said in his post-Mississippi State press conference. Kiffin has led the Rebels to four straight bowl games. “That’s been a very strange path. The first year with COVID, so you don’t even get a chance to play non-conference and get 10 wins or something, which arguably could have been our most explosive team had it not been for COVID and then opt-outs and an All-SEC schedule.
Kiffin: “We’ve had a lot of change — the portal and players and our staff.”
“We’ve lost multiple coordinators; all three coordinators. On special teams, we’ve lost every year and have a new guy. Just really proud of guys coming together; that’s not easy. About half our significant players are new, portal guys. That’s a credit for them to gel together. That system doesn’t always work, otherwise everyone would just sign all portal guys (or) everybody would sign all free agents in the professional sports. It looks good on paper sometimes, and then they’ve got to gel together. They’ve got to buy in and take lesser roles. That’s hard to do. I credit our guys.”
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The postseason is next for Kiffin and the Rebels.
Their likely landing spot is a New Year’s Six or Florida bowl such as the Citrus, of which Ole Miss has never played. The Rebels last appeared in an access bowl back in the 2022 Sugar Bowl.
“It wasn’t easy along the road,” Kiffin said. “Some guys aren’t even here anymore. These ones that stayed? These ones that bought in? It’s really showed up, because, here again, you had another second-half-comeback game, where we’re behind again.”
Here’s everything else Kiffin had to say following Ole Miss’ win over Mississippi State, its third in its last four tries.
