Fall camp is underway, which means two things: coaches are lying about depth charts, and Lane Kiffin is making the entire state of Mississippi want to flip a table.
On Tuesday night, Kiffin sat down with ESPN's Marty and McGee show and, with less than six weeks until he walks back into Vaught-Hemingway Stadium, decided that "keeping it low key" is for lesser men. "At Ole Miss, you can go 7-5, have 7-5 seasons, and you're good," Kiffin told the hosts. "They won't even complain in the off-season. It'll still be great." Sir. You left those people mid-playoff run. You went to their biggest rival. You gave a four-hour Vanity Fair interview. And now you're calling their fan base emotionally low-maintenance? Ole Miss fans were already sharpening every object within arm's reach for September 19. They are now sharpening those objects and building catapults. Pete Golding — the man who took Kiffin's roster, won two playoff games with it, and somehow managed not to say anything unhinged — is letting the work speak. Kiffin, meanwhile, is doing what Kiffin always does: winning the offseason bulletin-board competition before anyone else even opened PowerPoint.
While that soap opera drags us toward September, the broader SEC landscape this week is essentially a group therapy session about the Big Ten. On CBS Sports Network Wednesday, analyst Bud Elliott dropped the take heard 'round the Southeast: "Everybody else has much better quarterbacks" than the SEC — with Arch Manning as the lonely exception. Chip Patterson piled on: "The SEC has more CFP contenders than anyone. I do NOT think the SEC has more national championship contenders." Paul Finebaum, the man who has consumed and monetized SEC cope for decades, appeared on SportsCenter and said he's out on the conference ending its drought. When your own consigliere won't back you, you're in trouble. The Big Ten has won three straight titles. Ohio State is again the betting favorite. Indiana humiliated Alabama 38-3 in last year's Rose Bowl. The SEC's self-defense — that the nine-game schedule "gasses" teams before the playoff — is technically accurate and also the least satisfying answer imaginable.
And because college football can never just be calm for five minutes, a federal judge in Colorado earlier this month granted a class-wide injunction letting the entire high school Class of 2022 play a fifth year of college ball — right now — four weeks before Week 1. The NCAA called it "egregiously wrong" and filed an emergency appeal. The judge denied the stay. Rosters are in chaos. Compliance offices are operating on fumes and prayer. Several programs reportedly have no roster space to bring guys back even if they wanted to. The NCAA's position is essentially: we made a rule, a judge nuked it with virtually no hearing, and now undrafted NFL free agents could technically come back to campus. Somebody please help.
Trinidad Chambliss — who is back at Ole Miss on his own injunction, mind you — looked dialed in at fall camp Wednesday, connecting with Johntay Cook II and looking like the QB Kiffin built before he bolted. Which is perfect. Because nothing would be more delicious than Pete Golding's guys beating Lane Kiffin's guys with Lane Kiffin's system in front of Lane Kiffin's worst nightmare of an Oxford crowd. September 19. Circle it. Tattoo it. Do whatever you do.
