With Nick Saban retiring from college football, we're starting to hear more stories about the legendary head coach, including Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin recalling the worst reprimand he received from the seven-time national champion.
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Nick Saban once compared Lane Kiffin to a “spoiled bunny who went around creating havoc” 😂 pic.twitter.com/2JV6Fw8HKv
— zach ragan (@zachtnt) February 2, 2024
Kiffin was the offensive coordinator at Alabama from 2014-2016. While there, he and Saban won 40 games and lost four. They won two College Football National Championships. Kiffin has since become a successful head coach at FAU and now Ole Miss.
Regardless of the success, Kiffin still got reamed out by Saban on occasion.
Speaking with Chris Low and Harry Lyles Jr. of ESPN, Kiffin recalled a never-before-told story from fall camp in 2016.
To set the stage, there was a drill referred to as "good-on-good," which involved the starting offenses and defenses. Kiffin was told not to make the defense look bad, but he didn't oblige to that advice from fellow assistant coaches.
Well, Kiffin's offense was successful, scoring numerous touchdowns on many trick plays. Saban said Kiffin was only trying to win the drill and trick the defense.
The next day, in the same drill, Kiffin did the exact opposite.
"Stubborn old Lane, I ran the most generic, basic, under-center offense I could, sort of their old-school offense they ran under Joe Pendry," Kiffin said. "And the defense killed us. We'd be third-and-8, and I'd have the quarterback under center."
Saban didn't like this either.
Kiffin then said, "I'm just running what I thought you would want me to run against the defense."
After that response, Saban cleared the room and yelled at Kiffin to the point where he thought it was going to get physical.
During that, Saban compared Kiffin to P.J. Funnybunny, a cartoon rabbit character that's frequently mischievous.
Before becoming the offensive coordinator at Alabama, Kiffin had a lengthy career, including various roles at USC as the head coach of the Oakland Raiders and the Tennessee Volunteers.
As Kiffin admits, "So, yes, I got a lot of ass-chewings, but that's the biggest one and one that no one saw. But I deserved it."
