Everything Lane Kiffin said after Day 1 of Ole Miss Football fall camp

Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin met with the media on Tuesday after Day 1 of Ole Miss Football fall camp. Here’s everything he had to say after practice with the Rebels.

Kiffin’s Opening Statement: “Welcome back. First time with you guys since the tragic passing of Corey Adams. He was just with us for a short time, but he made a major impact on us by how he worked, who he was, how he led even as a freshman. Told the story at the service here the other night, very rarely do we ever have a freshman that in offseason conditioning and running was challenging seniors to finish in a standard and that’s who he was. Just a tragic tragic passing and obviously our thoughts and prayers have been with the family and having them up here and spending time with them, but out of respect to them, we won’t have any more comments on that. The players, we bumped up a day early, we were able to get a waiver so that they would have Saturday off for his funeral Saturday. 

“Kind of on another loss since seeing you guys, I just really want to thank Ole Miss and Oxford and the people here again (with) passing (of) my mother and celebration of life last week and Pastor Fish (Robinson) and how he led that andthe passion that he had, and how he spoke about her and so many people here that I just would have never guessed that my parents would end up finishing their lives in Oxford, Mississippi and and really it was an amazing time. To have my brother here and the grandkids here for both of them for the last few years. It was very special, but the people of Oxford were just amazing again. So I just want to thank everybody, especially Pastor Fish for that. 

“I think we’ve created a standard here — transitioning back to football here — of expectations in what we’ve done. I do take a lot of pride in that with our staff and our former players and what was done and our staff all coming back for this season. It’s very exciting because there’s so much player turnover in nowadays football. Anyway, no matter where you are, plus we lost a lot of great players number to the NFL. I said that at media day just to be in a position where we have these attendance records being set. Sold out season tickets already, three 10-win seasons in the last four years. There was three Top 12 finishes in the last four years and one the previous 51 years, really gives me perspective about what our players and staff have been able to do here. That’s the standard that we’ve created. It’s the expectations that we have. Twenty one wins in the last two years. These players have been talked to a lot about that and that’s hopefully why they came here was understanding that what we’ve been able to achieve and the level that we want to play at and expect to play at. Three winningest programs since COVID in the SEC, including the new programs, are Georgia, Alabama and Ole Miss. That’s our expectation and the standards of how we expect to play. 

“There’ll be a lot of competition in this camp, as always, regardless of what players have done before, they heard that last night. That reflected in practice today to create a very competitive atmosphere. I think that this team needs to really have a blue-collar mindset to outwork people and to grind people out in games, so we’ve been working on that, and it’s an exciting group of kids coming together.”

RELATED: Day 1 Practice Notebook as Ole Miss hits the field.

Kiffin on Alabama transfer Caleb Odom on working out with tight ends: “Yeah, I can’t totally predict that. He is very unique in what he can do. We did, as you said, move him in there a lot in that area today and I think that he’s got a chance to be a weapon there and we do have probably I would say positionally our best depth on our roster would probably be outside receiver and receiver in general. So him playing there, I think makes us even more dangerous.”

Kiffin on Caleb Odom playing more TE because of Luke Hasz injury: “Yeah, I just said that to our staff. We talk a lot about obstacles the way or of things happening that seemed to be issues at time and might be really positive things. I just said that right before I came down and we’re talking about it like maybe that might have been a really good thing. Obviously, don’t ever want somebody injured, but with that and the numbers outside versus that tight end spot and move him and then get Luke back and then be even more more dangerous with everybody playing all those spots.” 

Kiffin on changes to Ole Miss fall camp: “I think we had a lot of returning players last year, returning significant starters, whether they’ve been here or somewhere else. Kind of a veteran team and so this team is not that so there’s a little bit difference that way. There were also last year a number of players that were being managed with injuries, offseason surgeries from that veteran group. So this seems to be a lot more of our players are out there practicing and not dealing with injuries right now. At the same time too, we’ve got a lot more work to do and got to be a little more creative with things because we don’t have as established players as we did a year ago.”

On if Kiffin thinks Austin Simmons will be involved in the run game: “I mean, that’s a pretty schematical question, but I’m okay saying this, I wouldn’t picture him being really involved in a lot of quarterback runs.”

On handling mental health of players, staff, etc. with the passing of Ole Miss freshman Corey Adams: “Yeah, we just spent a lot of time with them. Even last night in the first team meeting, I talked to a lot because there’s so many new guys about, we’re very open door here. I know every coach says that and I tell our players and probably not much that you’re gone through that the staff hasn’t. The staff’s been through a lot in their their lives, very experienced staff that way, I would say with off-the-field things. I think we’re really close with our players that way. They know that we spent a lot of time with them and really try to help them through that. We tell them that as they come here, i’s not just our job to coach you and football, it’s our job to surround you with people that have have gone through the things you’re going to go through as premier college players.”

Kiffin on replacing Kelvin Bolden and Alex Brown: “Yeah, no update there. We weren’t really in a rush with kind of being in the middle of summer. Those guys did a great job for us. Excited for them to continue their career. We’re still in that process.”

Kiffin on learning curve with Ole Miss transfers and how the staff has tried to accelerate learning: “We do a lot more practicing, and the rules are a little bit looser that way now. I feel like it’s a little bit more pro -style that way, where we got more practices, almost OTA -ish. I think that helps, I think that unfortunately the world we’re in, it is not good and I’m not up here to gripe. I didn’t start with this or anything, it’s not a good system and it’s not good for college football. Professional sports don’t have this amount of turnover on the roster, not even close. So to do it in college and you’re on your third, fourth school and you don’t really care about the school, you didn’t pick it, you didn’t grow up wanting to play there, that’s not really good. It is what it is, all coaches I’m sure are just trying to maximize the situation that they’re in. But it’s not good for college football, it’s not good for locker rooms, and it’s obviously not very good for chemistry. I don’t think it’s very good for the passion of college football that everyone’s just free agents two times a year and a number of guys just going wherever to get the most money and not having any care for where they’re playing.”

On Ole Miss QB Austin Simmons getting on the same page as WRs: “They’ve had a good offseason, they were here in the spring. A lot of those receivers have had good careers already, very prolific receivers. Those guys have done a really good job together. I’d like to hope I’m not wrong, very well could be the strength of our team.”

Kiffin on not being talked up before the season as much: “I think it is what it is. We had a lot of really good players that got drafted and were on that team that were really good players, so that’s understandable. I do think that, again, it speaks to the program though, like Kyle was saying walking in, that number of people have said to him before, if you would have lost a lot of significant players here, you’d be looking at the voting and being at the bottom of the conference versus questions like that. Well, is it different that you’re not being talked about, you know, in the Top 10 in the country? So, it’s a good place to be for Ole Miss that those questions are coming up now.”

Kiffin on if Ole Miss plans to change contact in practice with this team: “No, I think you do (ramp up contact). I mean, you can do whatever you want, just in my opinion, what we’re gonna do. There’ll be more tackling, especially because you have so many new defensive people that are gonna play in space. So yeah, we need to do that.”