Lane Kiffin to be named LSU’s next coach

By Hunt Palmer

Three weeks of drama finally has its resolution. And it was a messy one in Oxford.

Lane Kiffin is LSU’s next head football coach.

The head coach of your Fighting Tigers. @Lane_Kiffin is Callin’ Baton Rouge! pic.twitter.com/NpXTeTL0Vo

— LSU Football (@LSUfootball) November 30, 2025

Kiffin will depart Oxford during a College Football Playoff run to assume his duties in Baton Rouge making him the first playoff coach to change jobs before competing for a national championship. That departure drug on for the better part of the weekend as Kiffin and Ole Miss administrators discussed options involving a potential berth in the SEC Championship Game and College Football Playoff.

Alabama’s win over Auburn knocked the Rebels out of the SEC Championship Game. In the following hours, multiple meetings were called and then subsequently postponed as rumors swirled regarding potential staff defections. Low reported that any Ole Miss staffers who did not board the plane to Baton Rouge with Kiffin on Sunday would not be on his staff at LSU.

BREAKING: Lane Kiffin has lined up most of his offensive staff to join him at LSU, @clowfb reports.

He’s told them if they’re not on the plane to Baton Rouge today, they won’t have a spot on staff👀

The Tigers have a press conference scheduled for Monday to officially… pic.twitter.com/IDmEvCbXwz

— On3 (@On3sports) November 30, 2025

In Kiffin’s six years at Ole Miss, he compiled a 55-19, 35-17 record that has included four 10-plus-win seasons in the last five years. He’s responsible for four of Ole Miss’s six 10-win seasons since 1972 and the only 11-win season in program history.

Prior to Ole Miss, Kiffin transformed the Florida Atlantic program by winning 27 games in three years including a pair of 11-win seasons. The Owls had been 3-9 in three consecutive seasons prior to his arrival and were 59-98 since becoming an FBS program in 2004.

Kiffin’s offensive prowess has defined his coaching career.

At Ole Miss, his Rebel offenses have ranked in the top 10 nationally five of his six seasons and never lower than 13th. He’s put up huge numbers with Matt Corral, Jaxson Dart and Trinidad Chambliss at quarterback.

At FAU, his offense finished ranked ninth nationally in total offense and sixth in rushing. He won two of FAU’s three conference championships in program history.

At Alabama, he helped Blake Sims, a converted running back, lead the SEC in touchdown passes en route to the national championship game which he did not coach in after accepting the FAU job. Nick Saban elected to have Steve Sarkisian run the offense against Clemson.

Traditionally, Ole Miss has struggled to land elite high school players at the same rate as its conference rivals like Alabama, LSU, Auburn and Georgia. Kiffin signed five straight top 25 high school classes according to On3 sports, but it was his early shift to the transfer portal that earned him the moniker “The Portal King.” Ole Miss inked four straight top-six portal classes including the 2024 haul that ranked atop the country and helped Ole Miss set a school record with eight picks in the 2025 NFL Draft.

Head coaching success took time for Kiffin who was named the youngest head coach in NFL history when the Oakland Raiders hired him as a 31-year-old in 2007. After one 4-12 season marred by the holdout of No. 1 overall draft pick and LSU product JaMarcus Russell, Kiffin was fired by owner Al Davis.

Ten months later, Kiffin was named head coach at Tennessee where he led the Volunteers to a 7-6 record, two wins better than the previous season under Phillip Fulmer. That tenure ended abruptly when Kiffin left in January of 2010 to be the head coach at USC where he had served as an assistant under Pete Carroll during one of the greatest runs in college football history.

Kiffin roamed the Trojan sidelines for three and a half seasons and was unceremoniously fired at the airport by USC Athletic Director Pat Haden after a 62-41 loss at Arizona State. Kiffin’s record at USC finished 28-15.

Nick Saban brought Kiffin in for the 2014 season as offensive coordinator where he revolutionized Alabama’s offense over three seasons before taking the head coaching job at FAU.

LSU beat out an aggressive effort by Florida and the pull of a College Football Playoff run at a program Kiffin built.

Now, his chase for a championship begins in Baton Rouge. LSU is 8-7 in SEC games over the last two seasons and 28-21 in league play since a perfect 8-0 season in 2019.