TRANSCRIPT: Everything Lane Kiffin said after the Rebels’ 45-10 win over Tulane

OXFORD, Miss. — Ole Miss beat Tulane Saturday night at Vaught-Hemingway and moves to 4-0 (2-0 SEC) on the season. It was a solid performance in all three phases of the game, with the Rebels tallying 548 total yards of offense, 307 through the air and 241 on the ground.

Tulane QB Jake Retzlaff only completed one pass in the first half as the Green Wave finished with 282 yards of total offense.

Afterward, head coach Lane Kiffin met with media to discuss the win. Here’s everything he said.

Lane Kiffin’s Opening Statement

“Alright. That’s a really good win. You know, Tulane’s a good team, really good program, well coached, tackles, extremely well. And I think if you look at their games, that usually doesn’t happen when teams play them even, you know. As you look at it, I think they went to Oklahoma last year and it was a tight game there. So, proud of our guys in all three phases to come out and play like that– I think 45-3 and then they get the last touch of 45-10.

It’s challenging to play that well, because a lot of people around them want to focus on the next week. And, you know, I guess probably a top-ten matchup next week with LSU. So, proud how they answered because I’ve been in those games and you’ve seen those games where they’re kind of flat and struggle. And some SEC teams, you know, lose to a team in the conference like that. So, just really pleased how they performed.

And the defense after a tough week of a lot of criticism — which was extremely fair by how we played last week — to answer that in the style that they did. I think there’s three maybe in a row, fourth down stops, which are basically turnovers. You know, when a team’s in four-down situations, it’s hard to stop them. It’s a lot easier when they’re, willing to punt. So just really, really happy how they performed.”

Question: Another big day for Trinidad.  How would you assess his performance and was Austin available today?

Lane Kiffin: Austin was available today, yeah. I thought Trinidad played great.  I loved the most important thing, not turning the ball over two weeks in a row, you know, because if you do that, you win a lot of games if you take care of the ball. And, the first offense didn’t turn it over back to back weeks, and he played really clean, you know? No balls on the ground and one sack. So I think we had one last week. So back to back weeks when you just don’t have negative plays. You know, he carries the ball 14 times, only loses two yards, only has one sack. You know, everything else is positive and he rushed for 112. So, what, 419 total in three and a half quarters is really good against a defense that has stopped a lot of people.

Question: Is today kind of what y’all saw when evaluating Deuce (Alexander) in the portal and what he could do for y’all in your offense?

Lane Kiffin: Yeah, we knew Deuce was explosive. You didn’t get to see him in a wide open offense to make all those plays, but we could just see what he did in their system. But he’s been doing that all camp, making plays like that. And we just made an emphasis of really saying, all right, we got to get more touches to him because even though there was a run, you know, where they have him bottled up and he makes a first down. Sometimes as receivers, they can disappear and not get many touches if you don’t go out of your way to get them touches. You know, the running back obviously kind of naturally gets them.

Question: Lane, after a pair of tight games against Kentucky and Arkansas, how relieving was it to beat a good Tulane team handedly without any drama?

Lane Kiffin: Really relieving. I know it was for me. I hope it was for our fans. It was because we really didn’t need another one of those type of games. And because I think in this conference, you’re gonna have a lot of them. And I’ve said that this model is set up, that the SEC bottom is going to be really strong. So you’re going to have a lot of hard games. You’re gonna have eight of them and then nine starting next year, because of the portal and teams may be down there, and they go and fill the voids. You know, it used to take maybe two years to get out of there, out of the bottom. So this was this was good to have against a team that normally doesn’t have a score like that against them.

Question: If Austin’s fully healthy next week, will he start? Or with what Trinidad’s doing is it more complicated than that?

Lane Kiffin: Yeah, I don’t know that. Like I said, Trinidad played really well. Austin was playing really well before he got hurt and I don’t know where Austin will be exactly. He was available, but he was not 100%. But he would have gone in today if we needed him. And that says a lot about Austin, too. You know, he got himself ready to play again this week.

Question: Lane, (Jake) Retzlaff is similar, at least in dual threat capability, to Taylen Green, who had a good first half against y’all last week. What was the adjustment for the defense to allow them to bounce back like they did? I think he only completed his first pass in like the last seconds of the second quarter.

Lane Kiffin: Yeah, I think that was the second one. But yeah you’re right. They had one completion going into that last drive. I thought our guys played assignments really well. And obviously there was a huge emphasis because you’re going to see — those are good coaches –You’re going to see the same plays that you didn’t stop the week before. So a lot of emphasis on the quarterback pulling it and and how to play that. And then, we let him out on the long run, you know? But we had a good scramble spy with Suntarine package for him that I think worked really well after we screwed up initially. But after that, I thought it was a really good game plan against him. And that’s what you expect from Pete Golding. You know that they may get you the one week, but you’re going to go back to work and and perform like that the following week.

Question: No sacks today, offensive line gave Chambliss a good pocket. Your overall thoughts on the offensive front?

Lane Kiffin: I thought it was good. I thought there was not a lot of negative plays, which is good, you know, same in the run game. So you could stay ahead and we didn’t get penalties. So like we only had one offensive penalty maybe five yards. So that didn’t give you some bad situations to have to overcome. And that had a lot to do with not having fourth downs any in the game. And what, 7-11 on third downs, I think.

Question: Not jumping the gun too far with you coach. But losing the players that you lost coming off last season, how do you kind of evaluate going into, at this point, being 4-0 going into LSU? 

Lane Kiffin: Yeah, every year is new, especially in this portal era. And you got to redo everything every year now. And rebuild your culture because you just don’t have enough of your roster back. And so, you know, I commend our building for that. You know, Kyle and his wonderful stats told me last week that it was the first time being 3-0, whatever, five years in a row since Coach Vaught. So, that’s a lot of years of starting really well. So I think that has a lot to do with having really good camps and players buying in to perform well early in the season.

Question: Doesn’t get talked about a ton, but Lucas Carneiro, the weapon that he is for y’all and matching his career high today, just what kind of confidence it allows an offense that you only have to really get past midfield.

Lane Kiffin: Yeah, it really feels good. We had a really good one last year and have a good one again. Because there was a long field goal there early…actually, analytics said to go for it but we still kicked just because I felt so confident in him and wanted to to get a score there.

Question: Lane, like someone else, kind of already asked. But the defense today, I mean, you guys just allowed the garbage time touchdown. But really three real points throughout the game. What can you say about the job that they did compared to last week when you guys allowed 35 to Arkansas?

Lane Kiffin: That was, we’ve not had defense like that around here, you know what happened last week (Arkansas), really since the Georgia game two years ago. So that was a hard one. Staff and players took it hard. They had a special meeting with just Coach Golding and the players Sunday night, no one else in there. And, they it’s been a long time together talking about getting it right. And what are we going to be on defense? Are we going to have the standard and play like we did a year ago? Or are we going to revert? So they really answered the call today.

Question: Seemed like you got a couple chances to talk with Austin throughout the game. I know it’s tough on him not being in there. How does he take it and how was he today?

Lane Kiffin: Just really try to keep him, you know warm, moving around because it really does tighten up on him, you know, over the course of a game because there’s a lot of standing around on it. And sometimes I just mess with the opponent, too. I act like I’m giving him a play that he’s going in. So it makes them think, I feel like from the press box, I don’t know if it really works, but I do a lot of that stuff in the game.

Question: You alluded to it in your opening comments. Next week, more than likely close to a top ten matchup with LSU. It’s at 2:30 again, just like this week. Is that a time you prefer when it’s that same time as the week before? Or. I mean, what what do you kind of feel like when it comes to that?

Lane Kiffin: I’m over that. I just know what it’s going to be. I’m going to, I told the commissioner, he was here today, we’re going to play LSU and it’s going to be day during our game here, and we’re going to go down there and it’s going to be at night. So we just know what it’s going to be. So it is what it is. I’m sure we’ll be at night at Georgia too, so you can just mark that one in. Hey, if you just set it up that way, you won’t be upset when it happens because you won’t start to think ‘maybe it’ll be different this time.’

Question: How hard is it, especially at quarterback, when a guy comes in after spring camp to be dominating the way he is? And what traits do you like about Trinidad at this point?

Lane Kiffin: Yeah, I think that says a lot about Trinidad, Charlie Weis, Joe Judge. You know, like both staffs had to do this because their (Ferris State’s) guy was late too. For Trinidad to play like this, says is a lot about him. And that’s a lot of preparation to get somebody ready because Austin was definitely our starter. And, Trinidad had to do a lot of mental reps and a lot of time in the office just going over things just in case and being ready and preparing like a starter.