Lane Kiffin is prepping for Saturday’s season opener against Furman, but the Ole Miss head coach has been in the news for other reasons this week, bringing an unwanted distraction to him as he prepares his squad for 2024.

Even with the focus on Saturday’s opener, Kiffin made sure to chime in on the recent comments that were made public — and denied by Nick Saban on The Pat McAfee Show— about the former Alabama head coach threatening to fire his agent, Jimmy Sexton, over hiring the now Ole Miss coach as the Crimson Tide OC.

While meeting with the media on Monday, Kiffin was asked about Saban’s recent positive comments about him being one of the best play-callers in the country.

“Yeah, as time continued to go on and you’re more removed, you have more appreciation for Coach, what he did for my career and taking a chance on me and what I’ve learned over the years, every day there’s something I pull from.”

The Rebels coach then made a point to comment on the alleged false conversation between Saban and Sexton.

“When he was asked about those comments, I think it’s a shame the writer puts quotation marks around comments and then the coach or the agent said they’ve never spoken to the writer about that subject. So I think that’s why he was kind of upset because both him and Jimmy said they never had that conversation with either writer.”

In their new book, The Price: What It Takes to Win In College Football’s Era of Chaos, authors Armen Keteyian and John Talty detail how an irate Saban once called college football’s most prominent agent,  Jimmy Sexton, threatening to fire him for placing Kiffin on his staff.

“That son of a b*****,” Saban said, in an excerpt obtained by AL.com. “I’m going to fire you, Jimmy, for ever talking me into hiring that narcissistic prick.”

According to FootballScoop’s sources, the writers of the book never spoke to Sexton.

Kiffin and Saban will always be connected, for better or worse.