“He'll try and steal Walker Jones” - Ole Miss HC Lane Kiffin comically accuses Auburn’s Hugh Freeze of trying to "steal" his coaching staff

Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin recently responded to comments made by Auburn Tigers coach Hugh Freeze regarding the Rebels' NIL collective, The Grove.

The Grove is one of the most successful NIL collectives, and have already been able to bring some of the best players to Oxford, Mississippi. This has been noted by the Auburn coach, who said:

“I think in the new world, that’s become harder and harder to do and you’re constantly searching ways with this new way of transferring and NIL to figure out exactly how to do it, I think there’s some who are doing it well, if you look at like Ole Miss and Missouri."

He added:

" I think they’ve done some really good things it looks like and trying to use NIL to their advantage and they’ve been able to maintain a winning edge.”

In reply to this, Lane Kiffin, who is known for making interesting comments about the college football world and his rivals, said:

"That's nice of him....(Next) He'll try and steal Walker Jones like he's tried (taking) all our coaches."

Walker Jones is the leader of the NIL collective at Ole Miss, and his claim that Auburn may try and steal him does come from a place of truth.

In January of this year, Auburn was successful in getting a coach from Ole Miss. Derrick Nix was the recievers coach, as well as an assistant coach at Ole Miss.

However, he then moved to (or, as Kiffin would say, "stolen by") the Auburn Tigers to become their new offensive coordinator.

Nix gave up working with one of the upcoming programs in the country, who are highly likely to make the College Football Playoffs this season, to work with an offense that this season has struggled at times.

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Lane Kiffin talks about how he deals with a struggling quarterback

Lane Kiffin used a moment of his weekly press conference to the media to explain how he deals with a struggling quarterback.

"On the field, there's a trust level there. I think it pays off when you have relationships and the quarterbacks trust you too. You go back to Matt Corral when he threw six interceptions, sitting down with him telling him we've got to do a better job calling plays. 'I've got to coach better, and don't worry. We've got your back.' I think that goes a long way and goes a long way with kids in recruiting, knowing what they're going to get when they get here and that they can trust us to have their back."

For Kiffin, when a quarterback is struggling, he uses this as an opportunity to work on his own coaching style and will find a way to help the player improve. In the long term, this will make them a better, more confident player able to deal with setbacks.

Meanwhile, Freeze has recently made two switches at the quarterback position after Payton Thorne and Hank Brown had a bad game, throwing numerous interceptions.

By explicitly mentioning the fact that former Ole Miss quarterback Matt Corral threw six interceptions in a game, before explaining that he would use it as a teaching moment, Kiffin highlighted the difference in coaching styles between himself and Hugh Freeze.