Lane Kiffin Wants To Embarrass Ole Miss After 6-Year Stint, Abrupt Exit For LSU

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LSU coach Lane Kiffin won’t be competing for a national championship Saturday night, but make no mistake, he’s heading into Oxford with laser-sharp focus.

Despite leading Ole Miss to an 11-1 record last season, Kiffin agreed to leave the program before the start of the College Football Playoff so he could became LSU’s new coach. Although fans considered it a huge betrayal, that didn’t stop him from agreeing to a seven-year, $91 million contract with the Tigers.

When Kiffin and the LSU football team step onto the field at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium, they’ll be heavily booed by Ole Miss fans. Obviously, Kiffin knows he’s going to enter a hostile environment.

“I told the players today, ‘Man, you don’t have anything to worry about as far as attention on you all week and everything,’” Kiffin said. ‘”There’s going to be so much attention, hatred, everything on me. You just get to go play.’ The pressure is on them. We won seven games last year, they won 13.”

While Kiffin claims Ole Miss is facing pressure to get the win, he knows anything other than a win won’t be acceptable.

According to Chris Low of On3, Kiffin wants to “embarrass” the Ole Miss football program this weekend.

“He doesn’t just want to beat these guys,” an LSU source told Low. “He wants to embarrass them, and he wants the heat, wants every bit of it.”

Tensions are already rising.

Earlier this week, LSU listed quarterback Sam Leavitt as doubtful due to injury. That surprised Ole Miss considering Kiffin never mentioned anything about his starter being less than 100 percent.

“No one on the Ole Miss staff is convinced LSU QB Sam Leavitt’s appearance as ‘doubtful’ on the injury report is sincere and he’ll miss the game on Saturday,” ESPN’s Pete Thamel said.

Interestingly enough, Leavitt was upgraded to questionable less than 24 hours later.

Suffice to say, there’ll be plenty of gamesmanship this Saturday in Oxford.

This story was originally published by The Spun on Sep 19, 2026, where it first appeared in the College Football section. Add The Spun as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

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