Ole Miss' Lane Kiffin, Master Troller, Says This Could Be 'Last Time' Against Nick Saban

TUSCALOOSA, Alabama - Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin has been a bit of a reporter this week.

Early in the week, he said he thought Alabama coach Nick Saban may have taken play calling duties away from defensive coordinator Kevin Steele because of how it looked to Kiffin on film. Saban said that wasn't the case. He only switched the way plays were signaled into players for speed.

And on Saturday, Kiffin intimated on the SEC Network here that this could be the last time he coaches against Saban. No. 15 Ole Miss (3-0) and No. 13 Alabama (2-1) kick off at 3:30 p.m. in Bryant-Denny Stadium on CBS.

Does Ole Miss' Lane Kiffin Know Something About Saban?

"We're excited for this opportunity today, and you never know how many more you've got," Kiffin said. "Maybe this is our last time."

Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin is 0-4 against Nick Saban as a head coach. He was Saban's offensive coordinator at Alabama from 2014-16. (Photo by Jonathan Bachman/Getty Images)

Kiffin may just have been talking about the fact that Alabama and Ole Miss do not play next season in the new SEC scheduling format that will debut with new entries Oklahoma and Texas. Alabama hosts Auburn, Georgia, Missouri and South Carolina while visiting LSU, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Vanderbilt. The dates and times of SEC games for 2024 are to be announced.

Ole Miss' home SEC opponents will be Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi State and Oklahoma in '24. The Rebels will visit Arkansas, Florida, LSU and South Carolina.

The new SEC format will have all teams playing the other 15 at least once every three years. So this could be the last Alabama-Ole Miss game until 2026.

As far as Kiffin's future, he is just 48 and making $9 million a year at Ole Miss, which signed him to a new contract through 2026 last December when Auburn wanted to hire him. He is likely not the one leaving.

Is Alabama Coach Nick Saban Considering Retirement?

Saban, on the other hand, will be 72 on Halloween and has already won seven national championships - six at Alabama since 2009 and one at LSU in the 2003 season. He is under contract through the 2029 season as the highest paid college football coach in the country with an $11.7 million salary this year. He will make $13.5 million in the last year of his deal.  

But Saban's 2023 season has not exactly gotten off to a great start.

And a close friend of Saban told OutKick last week that he thought Saban could retire after this season.

Kiffin knows Nick Saban well, having served as his offensive coordinator from 2014-16. The pair won a national championship in the 2015 season as Kiffin dramatically upgraded and updated Alabama's passing games that had grown stagnant. Saban also revitalized Kiffin's career when he hired him. Kiffin had just been fired as USC's head coach, and was not getting a lot of calls.

The two have remained friends. Kiffin still knows members of Alabama's staff and has former members of Saban's staff at Alabama on his staff at Ole Miss.

Before the game Saturday, they met on the field as usual and each were laughing and smiling.