There may not be an ultimatum but that doesn’t mean Lane Kiffin is staying in Oxford.
The Ole Miss football coach disputed a report from The Athletic that the school has given him an ultimatum to decide on his future before the Rebels’ next game against rival Mississippi State on Nov. 28, but he did not close the door on the possibility that he could be leaving.
LSU and Florida, two prestigious programs with high-profile openings, reportedly flew his families to Baton Rouge and Gainesville, respectively, although he did not travel with them.
“That’s absolutely not true,” Kiffin said of the report ultimatum said during “The Pat McAfee Show” on Tuesday.
“There’s been no ultimatum, anything like that at all. I don’t know where that came from, like a lot of stuff that comes out there. We’re having a blast. I love it here …. It couldn’t be better.”
Kiffin has emerged as a hot name in the college football landscape and it seems there could be a bidding war for his services.
LSU needs a new coach after firing Brian Kelly, while the Gators are in the market after canning Billy Napier. Both jobs are more prestigious than Ole Miss.
The Athletic reported that LSU had a private jet escort Kiffin’s family to town on Monday, while Florida hosted them the day before.
Kiffin’s ex-wife, Kayla, whom he reportedly is on fine terms with following their 2016 divorce, was part of the group touring Baton Rouge, per The Advocate.
His son, Knox, and his nephew joined Layla on the trips, per ESPN.
While he pushed back on the idea of an ultimatum, ESPN reported that Ole Miss representatives are pushing Kiffin and his agent, Jimmy Sexton, for some type of clarity.
The 50-year-old Kiffin didn’t shut down the notion that he could perhaps leave when addressing his future over the weekend.
“I love what we’re doing here,” Kiffin said Saturday after beating Florida in Gainesville. “Today was awesome. To even talk about it right now would be so disrespectful to our players and how well they played today. We’ve got a lot of things going here. Doing really well, and I love it here.”
Kiffin, who some connected to the Giants’ opening, has Ole Miss ranked fifth in the AP poll and carrying a 10-1 record into next week’s Egg Bowl on Nov. 28.
A win would lock the Rebels into a spot in the College Football 12-team playoff.
His contract runs through 2031, per the Clarion Ledger, and Ole Miss has told Kiffin and Sexton they will match any contract offer from LSU or Florida, according to the outlet.
Kiffin is the 10th-highest paid coach in FBS and fifth-highest in the SEC, per the network.
While the rumors swirl, he essentially told Ole Miss fans to worry about the noise on the field and not away from it.
“You pray for things. Our fans prayed for this type of thing and now we’re in the middle of it, so enjoy it,” Kiffin said during Tuesday’s show. “You’re 10-1, you got a bye week and get to watch half the country lose and there’s no way we can lose Saturday and then you play the Egg Bowl and go dominate that and keep that Egg Bowl trophy home where it’s been for a long time.”
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
