TRANSCRIPT: Lane Kiffin, Keith Carter host Peach Bowl Representatives Tuesday

OXFORD, Miss.– (Release) After registering a successful 10-win regular season, Ole Miss has accepted an invitation to play in the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl in Atlanta, Georgia, on Dec. 30, 2023. Ole Miss Vice Chancellor for Intercollegiate Athletics, Keith Carter, accepted the official invitation presented by the CEO and President of the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl, Gary Stokan, in front of media members on Tuesday.

A transcript of the official press conference can be found below:

Gary Stokan, CEO & President of the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl

“It’s a pleasure to be here and welcome you all to Atlanta, the capital of college football … Let me thank Keith, Kyle and Lane for their hospitality and congratulate them on a 10-2 season.“This is a game of firsts. A lot of firsts could happen in this game. The first time Ole Miss can win 11 games in its history of college football. The first time Penn State and Ole Miss are playing ever in college football. We started here in 2014 with the College Football Playoff, having Ole Miss and TCU as our first CFP game in the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl, and we are ending the CFP Era as we move into the 12-team playoff with Ole Miss in our game.

“As I said on our press conference day, styles make great fights. We have a tremendous offense against a tremendous defense … Over 53 percent of [Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl] games have been decided by a touchdown or less. It’s a very competitive atmosphere because we sell out. Particularly, Mercedes-Benz Stadium is going to be an unbelievable atmosphere with over 70,000 fans. We have sold out 24 of the last 27 games and expect this to be a sellout too.

“This year’s matchup will be our 56th Peach Bowl. We were founded in 1968. The ninth oldest bowl game, but the first game founded for charity. We take that very seriously as a part of our DNA. We gave recently $20 million to Children’s Health Care of Atlanta to start trials and find cures to eradicate childhood cancer.”

Keith Carter, Ole Miss Vice Chancellor for Intercollegiate Athletics

“We are very excited to be going to Atlanta to play in the Peach Bowl. It’s a very historic bowl with a lot of tradition there. It’s a great matchup, and for us, maybe no better city to go to than Atlanta for our fan base. We feel like we are going to ascend on Atlanta and take over Atlanta. We are really excited about that and certainly want to come down and put on a great show for Ole Miss and Rebel Nation.”

Lane Kiffin, Ole Miss Head Football Coach

“This is an awesome opportunity for our players. We’ve already kind of done this where I talked to you guys the day of when we found out about the bowl. Now to be around our players and to have some practices now that we know we’re playing in this, our guys are so excited to be in this big of a bowl against such a historic team to play in Penn State in such a great city of Atlanta, which of none of our kids are from. I know the parents, too, from talking to them are really excited to get there.

“This will be a tremendous matchup for us against a great coach, a great team of a lot of really good players. I don’t know the exact stats, but I saw something the other day of how many times Coach [James] Franklin has won 10 or 11 games in just the last eight years or something like that. They’ve been doing this for a while and are at a level that we want to get to. This will be a great opportunity for us.”

On scouting Penn State…

“It’s been a challenge with our own practice, preparing for the game, and then the recruiting schedule. It is what it is. I’m a little more familiar, but we’re still not all the way into game planning with our players yet because we’re so far out from the game. What we knew right away was they have a great defense led by their front. From learning more and watching a really balanced offense, they can really run the ball. The quarterback takes care of the ball. Like Gary [Stokan] mentioned, both teams do a really good job turnover-wise. This will probably be one of those games that you have to play really well in all areas to go down to the wire and make some plays at the end.

On players returning for Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl game and 2024 season…

“Again, this is a new era of college football. I’ve said when it all started, there’s no model to look after because the NFL would never have this setup. The free agency window with the portal opened up a week or two ago and we’re still playing games and have the postseason. It’d be like the NFL opening the preseason right before the playoffs or the Super Bowl. It is what it is. Within that, you have these guys deciding earlier. To me, this used to be more of a post or after-the-bowl-game decision with guys deciding to come back. Nowadays when you need to figure out your roster faster, I think that’s sped that up. If you wait that long and you have a bunch of guys go off and declare for the draft, you’re going to struggle to replace them because a lot of these portal guys have already signed to other places. I’m very pleased with how many guys came back. A lot of the guys who were ‘tweener’ guys going back and forth would have been draft picks but maybe not as high as they’d like. It’s really neat that they feel that way about the program and feel that way about the locker room that they would choose to come back. A lot of times that doesn’t happen because their dream is to play in the NFL. To put that on hold for a year says a lot about the culture in the locker room.”

Evelyn Van Pelt

Evelyn has covered sports for over two decades, beginning her journalism career as a sports writer for a newspaper in Austin, Texas. She attended Texas A&M and majored in English. Evelyn’s love for Ole Miss began when her daughter Katie attended the university on a volleyball scholarship. Evelyn created the Rebel Walk in 2013 and has served as publisher and managing editor since its inception.