Ole Miss Rebels College Football Postgame Quote, 01/01/2022

LANE KIFFIN: First off, congratulations to Dave [Aranda] and Baylor. They played a great game today. He had them ready to go. Magnificent defensive performance by them. Ten sacks, four turnovers, more in the analytics. And I bet you don’t ever win a game with that happening. So congratulations to them, well-deserved.

We had a perfect storm of, like we just said, ten sacks, four turnovers, three times in the red zone early on. Not only did we not get any points, we actually gave them seven with the pick six. So your defense can’t play lights out forever. Eventually, the ball broke and we gave up big plays.

So it’s just a shame. It is what it is, obviously Matt [Corral]’s injury was disappointing for the team, for him. So we didn’t do a good enough job calling plays around Luke [Altmyer] and making plays. A tough situation to put him in.

Again, congratulations to them. I’m not going to sit up here and talk about our miraculous season. We did some neat things, special things, some great memories. But we didn’t finish it, and that’s what we came here to do, not just to get a participation trophy. So not real excited.

Lane, did you get a sense of what Matt’s [Corral] injury was? Do you know if he has DSDI or any other sort of insurance?

LANE KIFFIN: Yeah, I am not going to get into Matt’s insurance. He does. This does not appear to be that type of injury where that would ever be a factor. Actually, his x-ray was negative. He just wasn’t able to go. So I don’t think that that’s a factor.

Lane, what were your emotions when you saw Matt [Corral] get injured? I know you were obviously very much so involved in the game. But what were your emotions seeing, that and how tough was that for you?

LANE KIFFIN: I probably didn’t do a good enough job. That’s obviously a difficult situation, especially when a kid is playing in the game. So my mind raced with a lot of thoughts right there. And that’s just for my love for him, just like I would if it was my own son in that situation.

So maybe I didn’t do a great enough job with the team because I was really hurting for him in that situation because I know how much he’s put into it, how much it means to him. And for that to be taken away like that really sucks.

Lane, how do you evaluate what you saw from Luke [Altmyer]? I know you haven’t gotten to watch the tape yet. But first big exposure, what did you think?

LANE KIFFIN: I thought Luke did some good things once he got playing a little bit and made some out-of-rhythm plays running around.

It’s a hard setting. That’s a really great defense. They give a lot of people problems. Not many people score a lot of points. Like I said coming into this, this would be like an NFL game, I thought, more low scoring. You are going to have to protect the football, play field position at times ‚Äì which we were not really aggressive in the fourth-down stuff because of that.

And we screwed it up. Like you say, you are going in to kick another field goal at least, and we get a ball tip for a pick six and missed two field goals. So that right there obviously changes the outcome of the game a lot.

Lane, obviously not the way you would have liked to see Matt’s [Corral] last game go. You talked a lot about him this season, what he’s meant to this program. Now that his Ole Miss career is done, how could you best sum up what Matt has meant to Ole Miss?

LANE KIFFIN: He’s been unbelievable and the things you don’t see besides the playing, just how he is. I had a cool moment this morning in the team meeting, just listening to him talk. I told our own coaches and players: You can be a freshman and you’re supposed to listen to the leaders. You can be a 50-year-old coach and you should listen to this guy.

I mean, what he said today to the team about after last season, after the Outback Bowl, and all he wanted to do was come back and impact players the way that Elijah Moore impacted him off the field as a person. He’s just real special, and he is going to make a great NFL player and do great for a franchise.

We didn’t play well, and we had things happen that I just wouldn’t have guessed. All the COVID work and everything and then I’m looking there playing the game thinking, our kicker is out, our quarterback is out, and our right tackle is out. So kind of freak stuff.

Lane, as you already addressed Jeff Lebby leaving. There’s reports of Wilson Love leaving for Oregon. There’s talks about DJ Durkin possibly having some opportunities. I was wondering if you might could address their futures on your staff. And then also does Luke’s [Altmyer] performance tonight change the way you look at the transfer portal at quarterback?

LANE KIFFIN: Wilson is going to Oregon. We’re happy for him. When you win like we did, and have an historic regular season, people come and want a piece of what you are doing. So that’s happened. We lost a couple the year before.

Lebby obviously is going and splitting time between there (Oklahoma) and back here. We appreciate him doing that in the bowl prep. That was not easy for him.

And the way our defense played tonight, DJ has probably got a lot of opportunities. He’s done a great job all season. I don’t know of any other opportunities or anything. But he’s done a fabulous job with our players, not just performance, but recruiting and flipping over a roster that ‚Äì you guys have followed it here ‚Äì one that statistically over the last five years of defense here, as bad as anybody in the country.

He’s done a great job, along with the other coaches, with flipping the roster over to play like they did tonight and like they did most of the season.

The Luke Altmyer part of this, did you see enough from him tonight where you would be confident in him being your future starting quarterback?

LANE KIFFIN: Yes, that’s a very difficult situation for any backup quarterback, especially a freshman ,to go into in a Sugar Bowl versus a really good defense. It’s not like we were lighting it up before he went in. We were struggling before.

I don’t think we did a great job game-planning. I thought they did a great job, and I thought it showed up. They outcoached us today on that side of the ball. Dave [Aranda] has done that to a lot of people, including myself at times.

Tonight didn’t go the way you wanted it, but do you take comfort that this was still one of the best seasons in this Ole Miss group?

CHANCE CAMPBELL: I think that’s something to be proud of. I think Coach [Lane] Kiffin hit it on the head, where no one really cares about how you start something. At the end of the day, it’s about how you finish it.

It’s a long time to have a bad taste in your mouth. I’m sure when we take a step away from this and get some distance, I’m sure we can pick out some positives; but for right now, it’s not great.

SNOOP CONNER: Same as what Chance [Campbell] said. That’s good, but we all wanted to win the Sugar Bowl. So, yeah.

How much does it affect you when your star quarterback (Matt Corral) goes down?

CHANCE CAMPBELL: Matt is a special player, a special leader and a special player. So when he’s not there, he brings a lot of juice to the team and obviously a lot of excitement and a lot of hope.

I think the guys had a lot of trust in Luke [Altmyer], and I’m personally proud of how he stepped in there. As Coach [Lane] Kiffin said, it’s a really difficult situation. He’s a young guy. I’m proud of him. But when Matt went down, that was tough.

SNOOP CONNER: Yeah, when Matt went down, we knew we was in a funk. Matt, he’s a great leader. He gives us juice. He runs our offense. We knew it was going to be tough when we went down. We tried to stick with Luke [Altmyer] and bring him confidence. We knew it was going to be tough.

Snoop, going off of that, what was the message or the mood in the offensive huddle after the quarterback went down? What were you guys saying as veterans to try to keep things afloat?

SNOOP CONNER: We just tried to give Luke [Altmyer] confidence and keep going.

How did you do that?

SNOOP CONNER: We just tried to have his back and play as hard as we can.

For the players, what was it like having Matt [Corral] on the sidelines after he got hurt? And what was he saying?

SNOOP CONNER: When he came back, he was just down because he wanted to be out there, but we kept telling him, “We got it. We are going to win the game for him.” Obviously it didn’t go that way. But with him being able to come back out there and just try to support us, it was big for us.

For both of you guys, I was curious if you have gotten to a point where you have made decisions about what you are going to do moving forward. And if you haven’t, what’s your timetable and the process you plan to use to make that decision?

SNOOP CONNER: That’s for another day.

CHANCE CAMPBELL: Yeah, right now, we’re just kind of taking in this loss. So that’s about it.

Coach [Kiffin], I wonder if you could speak to Dontario Drummond and his development in your time there. And obviously he is going to have a chance to play at the next level. What is it about him that makes him just a great wide receiver and could succeed at the next level?

LANE KIFFIN: Yeah, I think Drummond will play a long time at the next level. He will be a great special teams player, even though we don’t utilize him on that stuff, in the core of special teams. Really strong, hard to bring down. Played through a lot of injuries and really had a real special year and great kid.