Lane Kiffin still can’t stop talking about Brent Venables and Oklahoma

Ole Miss doesn’t really have another opponent on its schedule worth worrying about, so head coach Lane Kiffin is still caught up and talking about Brent Venables’ Oklahoma Sooners.

The Rebels beat the Sooners 34-26 on Saturday in Norman, but the two coaches, or at least one of them, are still going back and forth after a different exchange last week when Kiffin accused Venables’ defense of stealing signals. However, this time it wasn’t exactly Kiffin stirring things up out of thin air. A reporter threw Kiffin some bait about a coach-speak comment, and Kiffin, of course, gobbled it up.

Lane Kiffin responds to Brent Venables comment after Ole Miss win

First, the day after losing to Ole Miss, Venables was on his Sunday coach’s show talking to Voice of OU Toby Rowland. The two usually discuss the game and dissect some film.

“Unfortunately, we have to learn from some really tough mistakes,” Venables said to Rowland. “Hate that for our guys. I felt like we were the better team, but at the end of the day, this is a game of performance and executing, and I thought they out-executed us when it mattered the most.”

Some Ole Miss media, also still more focused on the Sooners than South Carolina this week, heard Venables’ comment and during Monday’s press conference asked Kiffin about Venables saying OU was the better team. That’s all it took for Kiffin to Kiffin.

"That's an interesting take. That's a hot take,” Kiffin responded. “I wouldn't have thought people watching it would say that. I felt like, one, we won at their place in weather that, as a defensive head coach, you would normally wish for, and won by eight points. And I think we left a lot out there. I think we should have won by a couple scores.

“So, I don't know how he evaluated that game that they were the better team. I mean, we had way more yards, 21 first downs to 14, and we played, what, 87 plays of offense and they had one sack and didn't force anything turnovers. That's an interesting take. But, whatever he needs to say."

Venables and Kiffin go way back even further than last week. They faced off last season as head coaches for the first time. Before that, they went head-to-head as assistants on different sides of the ball in big-time games. They met in a national championship game when Venables was OU’s defensive coordinator and Kiffin was the passing game coordinator at USC. They clashed for another three national titles when Venables was at Clemson and Kiffin was Alabama’s OC. Kiffin holds a 4-2 advantage in those meetings.

Once Kiffin took a breath during Monday’s press conference, another question was being asked, but then he went even further back than last week.

"Maybe they had the better team last year, too, when we beat them,” Kiffin quipped. “Sorry."

Then there was another interruption by Kiffin.

"Maybe he had the better team at Oklahoma when we beat them 55-19 in the national championship (when at USC),” Kiffin said. “Maybe. Maybe he had the better team at Clemson when we beat them 45-40 in the national championship at Alabama. Next question, my bad."

Kiffin will forever ramble like a scratched CD. The only way for Venables to shut Kiffin up is to beat him, wherever he might be coaching in the future. But it seems for the next year, or at least until Kiffin finds a new topic, he’ll be blaring at full blast toward Venables and Sooner Nation to draw more attention to that rivalry the SEC is trying to force.