Lane Kiffin did what he did, and he can’t get it back now. All the current LSU head coach can do is learn from how he left Ole Miss last fall, which created a firestorm in the SEC and all over college football.
While Kiffin was getting crushed everywhere for leaving an Ole Miss team that was heading toward a berth in the College Football Playoff, he was looking toward his next job at LSU for the 2026 season. Then Kiffin made it worse, in many people’s eyes and now in his eyes as he looks back, by his desire to still coach the Rebels even after he had struck a deal to become the next coach in Baton Rouge.
While speaking to reporters during sessions at SEC Media Days on Thursday in Tampa, Kiffin now looks back with regret over the whole messy transition. With a chance to reflect on Thursday as the 2026 season approaches, Kiffin said he should’ve just walked away when Ole Miss athletic director Keith Carter said to walk away.
“Yeah, I do,” Lane Kiffin said on Thursday. “But I think that’s a good thing that I look at life that way now, instead of saying, ‘No, I don’t. I was right.’ I look at things always now, like, how could I have done them better? But it’s also easier when you’re further removed. There’s no emotion involved.”
With Ole Miss pondering coaching offers at LSU and Florida, and with Ole Miss seemingly headed toward the Playoff after Kiffin led the Rebels to an 11-1 regular season, it created a circus situation that cast Kiffin in an awkward position. Then even after Kiffin accepted the job at LSU, he still spent 2 days fighting Carter to coach Ole Miss in the Playoff.
“I wish I would have gone in when I met with Keith and said, ‘I’ve made the decision to go,'” Kiffin said on Thursday. “I wish I would have just said, ‘Hey, I’d like to coach the team,’ and he’d say, ‘No.’ And I’d say, ‘Hey, OK, I appreciate it.’ (I wish I’d) move on (and) never even discussed it again.”
Kiffin even revealed that he spoke with motivational speaker Kevin Elko about the whole messy ordeal. The LSU coach said that Elko told him that he was “trying to do something impossible.”
With his awkward departure from Ole Miss in the past, now Kiffin is focused on leading LSU to an SEC title in 2026. Here is what the Kalshi market is currently saying about Kiffin’s chances to get the Tigers to the top of the SEC ladder come December:
Cory Nightingale, a former sportswriter and sports editor at the Miami Herald and Palm Beach Post, is a South Florida-based freelance writer who covers Alabama for SaturdayDownSouth.com.
