CARTER’S CORNER | Carter Bordwell
Recently, the world of college football was thrown into chaos after then-University of Mississippi head coach Lane Kiffin accepted the same position at Louisiana State University.
On the surface, the move looked bad. Kiffin was leading an 11-1 Ole Miss team into the College Football Playoff as the No. 6 seed, with a legitimate chance to compete for the program’s first national championship. Walking away at that moment felt, to many, like abandonment.
But that framing misses the real story. This is not about Lane Kiffin leaving Ole Miss. It is about Ole Miss refusing to allow Kiffin to coach the team he built because of bruised egos at the administrative level.
Kiffin made it clear he wanted to coach his team through the playoff despite taking the LSU job. Ole Miss athletic director Keith Carter made it just as clear that unless Kiffin signed a multi-year extension with the Rebels, he would not be allowed to remain on the sideline. That stance makes little sense. Why should a coach be forced to commit multiple future years to a job he no longer wants in order to finish the season he already earned? And why should he have to pass on one of the premier jobs in college football to do it?
Elsewhere, logic prevailed. Tulane coach Jon Sumrall and James Madison coach Bob Chesney both guided their teams into the playoff and accepted new jobs this cycle — Sumrall to Florida and Chesney to UCLA — while still being allowed to coach their teams.
No ultimatums. No loyalty lectures.
Imagine if those athletic directors had told their coaches they could not finish the season unless they agreed to stay at a lesser program for multiple years. The backlash would have been immediate and justified.
Critics argue Kiffin wants to “have his cake and eat it, too.” The better question is: why shouldn’t he?
When Kiffin arrived in Oxford in 2020, the program was reeling. Ole Miss was coming off several sub .500 seasons under Matt Luke and still dealing with the fallout from NCAA violations during the Hugh Freeze era.
Expectations were modest. Stability was the goal.
Kiffin delivered far more than stability. In six seasons, he transformed Ole Miss into a national contender, posting the program’s first 11-win season in 2023 and matching that mark again this year.
He helped redefine the Rebels’ identity, embracing the transfer portal and Name, Image and Likeness era earlier and more aggressively than most, turning Ole Miss into a model for modern roster building.
This was not a quick hit-and-run rebuild. Kiffin laid a foundation that positions the Rebels for sustained success. If loyalty matters, that should count for something.
The most common argument against allowing Kiffin to coach centers on recruiting and tampering — the fear he could steer Ole Miss players to LSU during the playoff window. Realistically, any player intent on leaving for a perceived bigger stage will do so regardless.
LSU sells itself. It is the only program outside of Ohio State and Alabama to win at least three national championships in the 2000s.
The Tigers’ track record of NFL development speaks loudly, with stars like Joe Burrow, Jayden Daniels, Ja’Marr Chase and Justin Jefferson already making names for themselves on Sundays. Kiffin does not need access to Ole Miss facilities to make that pitch.
And if tampering is truly the concern, the logic falls apart further. Several offensive assistants who left with Kiffin have returned to help coach Ole Miss through the playoff. If LSU staffers are allowed back in the building, why isn't Kiffin?
That leaves the final justification: loyalty.
Here, Ole Miss stands on shaky ground. The Rebels have been one of the most aggressive users of the transfer portal in the country, routinely benefiting from players leaving their original programs in search of better opportunities. Preaching loyalty now feels hypocritical.
The truth is simpler. Ole Miss does not want to be seen as the lesser program in a public divorce. Pride, not principle, is driving the decision.
In the end, the people paying the price are the players — the same players being asked to chase a national championship without the architect who built the roster, set the culture and led them to this moment. In a sport that claims to be about opportunity, that is a hard contradiction to ignore.
Bordwell is the Sports Editor of the Elgin Courier and Taylor Press. He can be reached at [email protected].
