Lane Kiffin addresses Texas A&M opening

If you had to pinpoint one person as ultimately responsible for pushing Jimbo Fisher out at Texas A&M -- other than Jimbo himself -- it would be Lane Kiffin.

Let's start with the fact that it was Ole Miss's 38-35 win over Texas A&M last Saturday, Nov. 4, that served as the final straw for AD Ross Bjork and the A&M Board of Regents. That loss triggered the board meeting last Thursday where the decision to end Jimbo's highly-publicized, wildly-expensive tenure. 

But it was more than just that one game, obviously.

Lane went 3-0 against Jimbo, and his 29-19 win on Nov. 13, 2021 was arguably the single most damaging of Fisher's 70-game tenure. At that time, A&M was 7-2 on the season, had beaten No. 1 Alabama four weeks prior, and was 17-3 in its last 20 games. The Aggies were ranked No. 11 in the country, with GameDay in town for the matchup with No. 15 Ole Miss and a No. 1 recruiting class weeks away from signing. The vibes were undoubtedly good. 

From that point forward, Texas A&M was 12-13 overall and 7-12 against the Power 5. Losses in Oxford bookended Fisher's tenure-ending 9-game road losing streak. 

Beyond that, Lane was Jimbo's No. 1 public antagonist. 

"It's basically like everyone's got different salary caps. I joked the other day, 'Are they gonna implement a luxury tax on Texas and Texas A&M?,'" Lane joked -- "joked" -- last year.

"We tried to keep him... We got outbid. Kind of a common theme with that program," Lane said on losing defensive coordinator DJ Durkin to A&M ahead of last season.

When Lane asked if A&M would have to pay a luxury tax for its No. 1-rated 2022 signing class, Jimbo shot back, referring to him and others as "clown acts." When Ole Miss won at Kyle Field the night before Halloween in 2022, Lane said, "Maybe Jimbo has a Joker outfit for me."

Lane said the things everyone else in college football thought. Eventually, even Jimbo's boss agreed with his coach's toughest critic. 

“Here’s the deal. You’re either moving forward or you’re stuck. We were stuck,” the Texas A&M AD said Sunday. “And so I kind of used the analogy with somebody earlier. You know how you’re driving down the highway, it’s a four-lane road, and I drive fast, okay. I like 75-80, and somebody’s in the left lane and they’re going 55 and they won’t move over. We were that car going 55. Something had to give. They had to get out of the way.”

And with the A&M job now officially open, none other than Lane Kiffin is appearing on lists of candidates for the job. Here's what our own John Brice wrote Sunday:

Ole Miss was humbled in dominant fashion this weekend by two-time champ Georgia, but Kiffin also took an admittedly lesser Ole Miss roster and just beat Fisher’s Aggies to open this month. The Rebels will be favored to win their final two games, giving the program a chance for its second 10-win season in three years.

For context: Ole Miss football hasn’t had such a stretch of success since the end of the 1950s and early 1960s.

Despite getting a lucrative new deal after last season from Ole Miss, Kiffin’s bottom-line buyout to exit Oxford, Mississippi, barely changed. He can buy out his deal for approximately $4.5 million.

The 2022 Aggie recruiting class -- the haul Lane loved to hate -- could factor in here.

After his ninth-ranked Rebels were waxed 52-17 by No. 2 Georgia, Kiffin said, "We have to recruit at a higher level. I'm not blaming (the players), we have to coach better. We have signed one five-star, (Georgia) signed 24."

Kiffin's 8-2 Rebels have lost only to Alabama and Georgia this season. He simply will never be able to recruit the same caliber of players to Ole Miss that he would at Alabama, Georgia, LSU... or Texas A&M.

Asked about the vacancy on Sunday, Kiffin said this:

How will the Aggies' search play out? Stay tuned to The Scoop for the latest.