Lane Kiffin expresses strong opinions on CFP rankings — and on South Carolina: ‘We could still be playing the game; They still might not have scored a touchdown’
OXFORD, Miss. – Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin held his weekly Sunday Zoom press this afternoon, and he made a strong pitch to the College Football Playoff committee, saying that he believes Ole Miss deserves a spot. While expressing his respect for South Carolina — a team that could potentially jump the Rebels in the CFP rankings — Coach Kiffin left no doubt as to where he stands.
Coach Kiffin was asked what he would say to the committee. He spoke on the Rebels’ losses to Kentucky, LSU, and Florida, along with how they compare to the rest of the SEC.
…There’s no perfect teams out there. And, I — look, you guys that have covered us would know I’ve said this before, so this isn’t just politicking — Football is a very hard sport, and things go wrong at ends of games and a kick goes in or it doesn’t, or a ref makes a call or they don’t. So I’m not even talking about this. I’m just talking in general. And when games come down to that, that doesn’t necessarily mean this team is better than that team. You know, they happen to make one more play at the end, or a field goal goes in or out and so many games come down to that, one-score games. And we were on the good side of that a year ago. We were 4-0 in 1 score games (last year). Now this year. So, I’ve said, we’re actually a better team this year than a year ago, even though we were 10-2 and now we’re 9-3 in regular season. But those are three one-score games, one-play games. One in overtime, another one in both the first two losses they’ve got to make fourth and six conversions. And then in our other nine games, okay, really every game has been double-digit wins or more. Really, all of them haven’t been close at the end for nine games. So to me that describes a really good team that played three super close games and didn’t find a way to win them in the end. I think somebody said, you think about the SEC being the best conference, and we’re the only team that hasn’t lost by more than one score. Everybody else has lost by more than one. Everyone, including Texas, because it’s a hard league. So I think it shows we’re really good. And, you know, there’s a very telling stat that usually we use to describe teams when we play them, and that’s offense + defense efficiency that ESPN puts out, and that’s a telling stat. How good is your team? Like who do you want to play? You don’t want to play people high in that because it shows they’re really good teams on both sides of the ball. And you know we’re in the top six and the other five are: Bama, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Oregon and Penn State. Well where are all those guys going? They’re all going to the playoffs. So I think that shows what type of team we are that screwed some super close games up but are really good team.”
Lane Kiffin on the Rebels’ losses
Later on, Lane reflected further upon the loss to Florida, recognizing that if Gators’ QB DJ Lagway had not exited the game against Georgia, Florida might have won against the Bulldogs as well.
“People say, ‘Oh, they had a loss to Florida.’ Florida is playing great right now… we played really well, we just didn’t finish off that game… once Tre (Harris) got hurt, we struggled on offense.”
– Kiffin on the loss to Florida
Lane on South Carolina: ‘We could still be playing the game. They still might not have scored a touchdown.’
Looking at the AP Poll that was released earlier on Sunday, the Rebs stayed ranked as the No. 15 team, ranked below South Carolina, who Ole Miss beat 27-3 on the road in October. Carolina is coming off a three-point win over No. 12 Clemson, despite finishing their year with the same record as Ole Miss.
Coach Kiffin made it absolutely clear why he thinks the Rebels should be ranked higher than the Gamecocks.
“First off, I have great respect for South Carolina. I think they’re a really good team. Really good team. Well-coached, really good players. But I mean, when you just said that South Carolina jumping us…why do we even play games if that’s the case? If South Carolina were to jump us and we play in the same conference, very similar schedules. We have the same record, so normally you’d say, ‘well, what would happen if they played each other?’ Well, we did, and we went to their place and ran them out of their place. I mean, this is 24-point SEC road win and we’re just handing the ball off in the fourth quarter, like to get out of there. So that should not even be…if the committee’s even thinking about that, then what do you play the games for? Because that’s what everybody always says: ‘Well, what if this team played this, then how would they do?’ That’s the hard thing of comparing these different conferences. Well, we did at their place and it wasn’t even close. I mean, I don’t know. We could still be playing the game. They still might not have scored a touchdown.”
– Kiffin on South Carolina
The rest of what he said….
Coach Kiffin was asked about recruiting and the upcoming Signing Day, as well as player personnel decisions.
Coach Kiffin on the Egg Bowl win:
“Well, awesome to keep the Egg Bowl here. We know the magnitude of it all week and then even afterwards, the excitement of the Mississippi people and, you know, just so happy for these seniors, especially the ones that have been here a long time and really, like they mentioned, the year before they got here, we got here, you know, lost the game and then to — over the last five years –to go four and one and the programs being in such different places than where it was when we got here, is really exciting.
Kind of hit me, too, like, there’s so much we wish we could have changed in these three losses. But to be 9-3 and to have 20 wins in the last two years is really good at anywhere, especially here. So, just excited for these guys to finish their home season off like this. You guys have had a lot of home wins, and i think since post Covid, you know, when we got on normal schedules here, I think that these guys have been 25-3 at home. So that’s pretty cool.”
Coach Kiffin on the mood heading into Wednesday’s National Signing Day
“Great. We had a great weekend from guys that were here or even came (a day later) because some guys played a game. So they just came here yesterday and today and have had great responses from them about where Ole Miss is and wanting to come here. And, you know, we do these print outs. Our recruiting people do for them and we show them Ole Miss, like we said since Covid, this has been a really cool place to play. Really good home environment, like I said, 25-3 at home.
And they printed out the SEC records, Georgia has the first record at 46-2, regular season. Alabama 41-7 and Ole Miss is third. And that’s even with the teams coming in. Texas is next, Tennessee, LSU, Oklahoma, Missouri, South Carolina, Texas A&M, Kentucky, Florida, Arkansas, then Auburn, Mississippi State, Vanderbilt. That’s wins in the regular season since 2021. So, it’s a lot to tell the recruits that we’re not just doing well one year, you know, or because we have a good quarterback. We’ve been we’ve been playing really well in the hardest conference in football with the third-best winning record.”
Lane on how much of a final say his assistants have with player personnel of if he has the final say:
“I do. I just think that assistant coaches will come and go, and so used to kind of let them have the say when I was younger head coach. But then you realize, okay, well, that’s great until the guy leaves you or you make a change. And then we got the players they wanted instead of me having an overall view. So, um, we got a great GM in Billy Glasscock. And, so we make the final decisions.”
To see where Ole Miss lands in this week’s CFP rankings, be sure to tune into ESPN at 6 p.m. central on Tuesday night. Until then, Hotty Toddy and go Rebs!
