Ole Miss vice chancellor for intercollegiate athletics Keith Carter perhaps took a shot back at Lane Kiffin and/or Steve Sarkisian’s ignorant comments in their latest public interviews.
Carter, on Tuesday morning, tweeted, “Kind of amazing how uncomfortable our success is making some people,” on his X account. The response came one day after some of Kiffin’s responses appeared in the Vanity Fair piece. It also came right after Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian made comments to the USA Today about how easy it is to get into to Ole Miss versus Texas for transfer portal players.
In the interview with the magazine, one of the shots Kiffin took at Ole Miss was this race-based commentary. He said recruits would tell him, “‘Hey, coach, we really like you. But my grandparents aren’t letting me move to Oxford, Mississippi.’ That doesn’t come up when you say Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Parents were sitting here this weekend saying the campus’s diversity feels so great: ‘It feels like there’s no segregation.’”
Yet for six seasons Kiffin constantly recruited in some of the nation’s top African-American athletes.
Many of those African-American athletes have taken to social media to disprove what Kiffin said. That includes former offensive lineman Javon Patterson and former wide receiver Donte Moncrief, who tweeted pictures of them and their families at Ole Miss.
Former Ole Miss offensive lineman Javon Patterson and family.
Patterson tweeted, “Say what you want… But the COMMUNITY of people makes Oxford, MS special. Take a walk in the Velvet Ditch by yourself like I did coming out of high school and you’ll see for yourself what makes it special. Shirley Patterson knew and now my kids will know. Home is Home.”
Moncrief tweeted, “Oxford Ms The University of Mississippi Real Family From my time to my kids its forever HOTTY TODDY..”
Ole Miss hosts LSU on Sept. 19. Kiffin just made the game much more about football.
The Rebels travel to Texas on Oct. 24. Sarkisian may have, too.