Now that head coach Lane Kiffin has left Ole Miss to take the job with the LSU Tigers, the Rebels are now tasked with picking up the pieces and continue their historic season. Sitting with an 11-1 overall record, Ole Miss seemingly solidified their College Football Playoff standing with their 38-19 Egg Bowl victory over rival Mississippi State this past week. Unfortunately for the Rebels, the defection of Kiffin could cause some playoff controversy on the horizon.

It wasn’t long ago that we saw an undefeated Florida State team, who won the ACC championship, be knocked out of the playoffs once their starting quarterback Jordan Travis was lost for the season. The argument at the time was that his absence had changed the complexion of that team, which had to be considered by the committee when making the final rankings. It was a very controversial decision at the time, but in hindsight, it was probably the correct one.

When the committee does make their decisions about which teams get into the playoffs, they do so based on four pieces of criteria.  Those are 1.) strength of schedule, 2.) head-to-head competition, 3.) comparative outcomes of common opponents, and 4.) other relevant factors such as unavailability of key players and coaches that affect the team’s performance. This conversation centers around No. 4 on that list.

We will receive the ultimate decider on this difficult decision on Tuesday night. For now, the debate around Ole Miss and the playoffs will continue to rage on. Fellow A to Z Sports analyst Joe DeLeone joined me to discuss what the committee will, and should do.

DeLeone’s take on Ole Miss

Ultimately, Ole Miss should not be removed entirely from the College Football Playoff bracket because of Lane Kiffin’s departure. However, they should likely drop slightly in the rankings due to losing their most important asset.

This circumstance is one based on precedent. The committee created a controversial and ridiculous one in the past, and has the opportunity to develop another catastrophic one that they must avoid.

The one they created was the result of its own protocol that forced Florida State out of the final four team CFP back in 2023. Without their star quarterback, Jordan Travis, they leaned on a stipulation that a team’s ranking could be affected by the availability of key players. At the time, it was a ridiculous decision because that team wasn’t defined by its quarterback, and we’ll never know whether they could have survived against Michigan in the Rose Bowl.

Sadly, for that reason, Ole Miss will need to drop; otherwise, the committee becomes a contradictory mess. If they keep going back and forth on key tenets of team evaluation, no one will ever trust the committee. And this is at a time when very few do trust their decision-making.

Not having your offensive mastermind and offensive coordinator, Charlie Weis Jr., will slow this Ole Miss squad down. They’ve been one of the best offenses in the country, and without their brains behind the operation, they’re going to take a step backward.

The CFP has an opportunity to handle this effectively by dropping Ole Miss only a few spots rather than completely removing them from the playoff field. If they remove Ole Miss, despite having their starters and the defensive staff, it would cause everything to unravel completely.

Hopefully, they handle this appropriately, but I’m not holding my breath.

Roberts’ take on Ole Miss

How the committee handles this situation is going to be fascinating. We have already seen, although in the four-team format, that they are willing to consider the current state of the team, and not the entire resume. While it was considered unjust at the time, the committee’s decision to keep Florida State out of the playoffs a couple of years ago was probably the correct one. With a coaching staff overhaul offensively, and some players potentially leaving as well, this just isn’t the same Ole Miss team as we just saw a few days ago. That has to be considered.  

What Ole Miss has in their favor compared to the Florida State situation is that we haven’t seen what the new product looks like, and we won’t until the postseason begins. The committee being able to see how underwhelming the Seminole offense was without Travis gave them a data point for what this new team was, and more easily defined their floor and ceiling. With Ole Miss right now, it is a pure guessing game, which is good for their chances.

That is why I believe that the Rebels will still be included in the playoffs, especially with it being a 12-team variety. There is a chance that they get dropped a bit because of the coaching change, but it feels unlikely that they will penalize them to that degree. We will know on Tuesday night for sure, but those are my expectations right now.

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Ryan Roberts