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One of the first viral moments college football analyst Paul Finebaum had on ESPN came in 2013 when he said Lane Kiffin, in some respects, was the “Miley Cyrus of college football.”
At the time, Kiffin wasn’t considered to be the high-level coach he is presently at Ole Miss. Kiffin, much like Miley Cyrus, had a famous father in NFL – Monte Kiffin – who was a legendary coach with the defensive schemes he cooked up to help win the Tampa Bay Buccaneers a Super Bowl and the Nebraska Cornhuskers two national championships.
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Miley Cyrus attends the 66th GRAMMY Awards at Crypto.com Arena on Feb. 04, 2024, in Los Angeles, California (Photo by Neilson Barnard/Getty Images for The Recording Academy)
Lane Kiffin was briefly the head coach for the Oakland Raiders before taking the Tennessee Volunteers job and eventually the USC Trojans job. As Kiffin’s tenure was beginning to fizzle out at Southern Cal, Finebaum made the infamous comparison.
Finebaum recalled the moment in a recent interview with OutKick founder Clay Travis. He said he was no fan of Kiffin because of how he left Tennessee, but after he made the comparison, he heard it from his wife and co-workers.
“I ended the soliloquy with ‘Lane Kiffin is the Miley Cyrus of college football.’ Miley Cyrus was not hot at the time,” Finebaum said. “And I walked off the set – nobody talked to me. I didn’t realize Kiffin was one of the boys. I get on a plane in Atlanta, I’m still living in Birmingham, I land. My wife picks me up. And she says, ‘Why in the world did you say that stupid stuff about Lane Kiffin?’ She said, ‘I don’t think they’ll ever have you back on the show.’ Gene Wojciechowski took me to the airport and said, ‘That was the dumbest thing you ever said.’”
Finebaum said he remembered waking up on the Sunday after his viral “College Gameday” moment to phone calls from bosses at ESPN and breaking news on “SportsCenter.”
Mississippi Rebels head coach Lane Kiffin looks on during the fourth quarter against the Georgia State Panthers at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium on Aug. 30, 2024. (Petre Thomas/Imagn Images)
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“I go home. Everybody’s mad at me. I screwed it up. I go to bed. I wake up. I grab my phone and I’m stumbling into the kitchen,” he said. “I got a phone call from 860, which is Bristol, Connecticut, I flip on the TV, ‘SportsCenter’ – Breaking news, Lane Kiffin fired on the tarmac after losing to Arizona State. And the next thing I saw? Me calling him the Miley Cyrus of college football.
“And it just blew up. Kiffin held it against me. He brings it up in every interview. I cost him his ‘dream job’ even though he’s had quite a few since then. It just became part of the tapestry of Lane Kiffin and myself.”
Kiffin has risen from the lowest of lows to one of the top head coaches in college football.
Following his departure from USC, he became an offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach under Nick Saban at Alabama. He was then the head coach at Florida Atlantic before the Ole Miss job opened up.
Kiffin has led Ole Miss to a bowl game appearance in each of the first five seasons he’s been at the helm. He’s had three 10-win seasons as well.
Ole Miss Rebels head coach Lane Kiffin speaks to the media during SEC Media Day at Omni Atlanta Hotel on July 14, 2025. (Jordan Godfree/Imagn Images)
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Currently, Ole Miss is No. 4 in the nation with a 5-0 record to start the year. The Rebels topped then-No. 4 LSU last week and surged up the poll. They have a bye this weekend before getting ready to play Washington State on Oct. 11.
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