Paul Finebaum reacts to Ole Miss hiring Pete Golding, bashes 'disgraceful' Lane Kiffin departure

It’s been a chaotic few days in Oxford. Now, the Ole Miss program is set to try and move forward in the wake of the Lane Kiffin saga and find College Football Playoff success under Pete Golding.

Paul Finebaum appeared on McElroy and Cubelic in the Morning on Monday. There, he admitted he can’t remember a more chaotic coaching change in his time covering the SEC than Kiffin’s move to LSU.

“Easy answer, no,” Paul Finebaum said. “I mean, there were a couple of close calls. Greg Schiano at Tennessee. The whole Les Miles debacle at LSU. There have been a few at Alabama. There’s nothing that would ever have told me that Lane Kiffin would leave and that on the same day that he got on a plane for Baton Rouge, Pete Golding would be named the head coach at Ole Miss. You could’ve given me a thousand scenarios and I couldn’t have predicted that one.”

By now, the Kiffin drama has been very well told. He made the decision to leave for LSU, but wanted to coach the College Football Playoff at Ole Miss. Athletic director Keith Carter and the administration felt they couldn’t allow that. So, Kiffin responded by trying to poach staff before the CFP while Ole Miss promoted defensive coordinator Pete Golding to head coach.

“I could have predicted Lane leaving but not Golding ending up — but they were forced into a situation,” Finebaum said. “Because the coaches were off the board and they had to do something that Lane Kiffin didn’t do. That’s actually think about the players on the team and what’s their best path forward to deal with the greatest accomplishment in Ole Miss history in modern times, going and trying to win a Playoff. So, again, there’s so much than can and will be said about Lane Kiffin, but the easiest thing for me to say is he abandoned his team and that is disgraceful.”

Finebaum feels that this whole situation has been bad for Kiffin’s reputation. After some bad exits in the past, notably at Tennessee and Alabama, he had rehabilitated his image and found success. Now, that image may be tarnished again.

“I know what all the talking heads have said,” Finebaum said. “But we also know that Lane Kiffin is a master manipulator and everyone on this panel can attest to that. But, ultimately, Lane Kiffin did a really nice job in a matter of a very short period of time of literally burning down everything he has built in Oxford and good luck in Baton Rouge.”

Greg McElroy followed up by trying to paint the challenges in this situation. In particular, Kiffin wanted to do both jobs. However, Finebaum cut him off at that point. Finebaum would emphasize that he had every right to coach the CFP this year, but chose to go and needs to live with that choice.

“Greg, hold on just a second. Hold on just one second. If Lane Kiffin wanted to coach the Ole Miss Rebels, he could have coached the Ole Miss Rebels, and that’s by being the Ole Miss Rebels coach,” Finebaum said. “And not saying, ‘I want to go here but do this.’ It’s really not complicated at all. I think everyone in the media has gotten really carried away with trying to say two things are right. Two things are not right here. If you’re the head coach, you coach your team. You don’t leave your team and on your way out say, ‘Hey, by the way, can I coach the team a few more games?'”

For now, the Ole Miss team needs to move on very quickly and focus on the CFP. Kiffin, meanwhile, is tasked with rebuilding LSU and getting them into a future CFP.