Lane Kiffin had a story ready when Nick Saban started talking about the challenge of walking back into a hostile road environment.
The two were on SEC Now during Day 4 of SEC Media Days, and Saban used the moment to tease Kiffin about what LSU fans might have waiting for him when Ole Miss hosts the Tigers. Saban said Kiffin should call him for advice, pointing to his own return to Baton Rouge after leaving LSU for Alabama.
“You’re going to break the record for the ass-kicking you get for the place you go back,” Saban told Kiffin. “Because I have it right now when I went back to LSU after leaving and going to Alabama. I’ll give you some coaching points on how to get through that.”
Kiffin’s answer was to say he might need help from Miss Terry instead. That opened the door to one of the better SEC Media Days anecdotes of the week: a memory from his Alabama days when the Crimson Tide went to Baton Rouge to face LSU.
Kiffin said he saw Miss Terry sprinkling holy water on the ground before the game.
“I’m walking on the sidelines for the LSU game, they still dislike him at the time, they’re yelling stuff at him, she’s got this stuff and she’s putting it on the ground, and I’m like ‘what are you doing?’ and she’s like ‘there’s real voodoo here, they don’t like Nick here so I’ve got to spread this stuff out to make sure he’s okay.'”
Alabama won both of those games at LSU while Kiffin was the Crimson Tide’s offensive coordinator.
Now Kiffin gets his own return trip to a loud place on September 19, when LSU visits Ole Miss in a game expected to draw College GameDay and a packed, hostile crowd.
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Kiffins own return to Ole Miss figures to bring a similar kind of heat, and Saban apparently made sure he understood the assignment. The conversation even veered into one of those only-in-college-football anecdotes about Sabans wife trying to counteract the bad vibes around LSU games, which only adds to the legend of those trips. However Kiffins next visit unfolds, it sounds like Saban believes he may need all the help he can get. [Read more 🡒]