On Nov. 21, Jon Sokoloff dropped a bomb on the college football world, appearing to break a story that had been rumored for weeks: Lane Kiffin was Auburn’s next head coach.
The WCBI reporter in north Mississippi tweeted, among other things, that “Lane to Auburn is happening.”
Kiffin took exception, tweeting “that’s news to me” before later tweeting an image of a faux news release of Sokoloff taking a new job at a different station.
— Lane Kiffin (@Lane_Kiffin) November 22, 2022
Reports surfaced the next day that Kiffin had met with his players and assured them he was staying.
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Kiffin would not have been the first coach to tell bold-faced lies about his future. For some in the profession, it’s a time-honored tradition. But Kiffin was leaning so hard into insisting he was staying, if he’d done anything else, he would have set himself up to become an all-time villain in Oxford.
In his postgame news conference after losing the Egg Bowl on Thursday, Kiffin twice insisted he was staying. He also called out Sokoloff by name and criticized his reporting.
“When it was falsely reported by Jon who’s now famous, congratulations, that you can just write whatever you want. I’d do it too because you’re never held accountable, and you get to become famous, and maybe you’ll be right,” Kiffin said. “Jon did it, so I had to have a team meeting to say his article was wrong.”
Sokoloff reported on Friday that Auburn’s next head coach would be “either Lane Kiffin or Hugh Freeze,” straying from his original reporting. That was proven correct on Monday when reports surfaced that Freeze was Auburn’s new coach.
Kiffin announced he was staying in Oxford on Friday, the day Sokoloff said Kiffin would announce his departure. I know little of Sokoloff’s reporting or the vetting process behind it. He did not respond to a request for an interview on the subject.
But there’s a reason why reporters with more experience reporting on the coaching carousel use terms like “targeting” or “closing in on” when a program is nearing a deal with a coach. That might have helped save him some grief.
In a Notes app post Sokoloff tweeted out Saturday, he twice used the word “change.”
Things do change, especially before a coach puts pen to paper.
“Our original reporting had Kiffin headed to Auburn. At the time of that report, multiple sources, independent of each other, confirmed. Ole Miss denied the report, and we published that. This has changed often,” Sokoloff wrote. “Our reports have included each update and also Coach Kiffin’s public frustration with sources reports. It is the job to report based on solid information. That information can and does change, and we have reported that as well.”
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Considering the outcome, it’s hard to argue Sokoloff did anything other than what every journalism teacher in America warns not to do: He rushed to be first rather than being certain he was right.
Let’s take a look at what stood out from the world of college football on TV this past weekend:
• ESPN’s Dave Pasch offering a look inside his production meeting with NC State head coach Dave Doeren was eye-opening. Doeren let loose on his disdain for rival North Carolina and offered a frank look at some trade secrets about his feelings.
“They don’t like us; we hate them,” Pasch said, paraphrasing Doeren. “We’re blue collar; they’re elitist. Their coaches talk down to us; they talk behind our backs in recruiting and negatively about our coaching staff.”
Pasch aired the thoughts live on the broadcast. Like Pasch, I can’t believe Doeren allowed them to be on the record. You rarely hear coaches share honesty like that, and you even more rarely hear them do it and let it run on the broadcast of a game featuring the program they ripped.
• Robert Griffin III has continued to do things his own way and has trimmed some of the double entendres that toed the line earlier this season. In the open to Baylor’s loss to Texas, Griffin pointed to his co-host in the booth, Mark Jones, and wished viewers a happy Black Friday.
Call it polarizing or corny, but I laughed. I haven’t laughed at the open to a college football game maybe ever. There’s value in that.
— no context college football (@nocontextcfb) November 25, 2022
• It’s not often any coach calls out an analyst by name, but South Carolina’s Shane Beamer did exactly that after upsetting Clemson on Saturday. He noted that ESPN’s Jesse Palmer said Clemson needed to have an impressive win to make an impact on the committee (true) but it needed to actually win the game (also true).
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It was good-natured, but I call this one a draw. Great television and about 1,000 times better than the average postgame coach interview.
• Chris Fowler is one of the best play-by-play men working, so I had to do a double take and consider whether I was mistaken when he called a 12-yard gain on third-and-20 like a game-winning touchdown.
Like USC receiver Mario Williams did on the catch, Fowler presumably mistook the first chain for the line to gain. Either way, the honest mistake was some humorous, unnerving television.
— Turtle’s Hat (@FittedHatTurtle) November 27, 2022
The awkward silence as Fowler tried to figure out what just happened, followed by Kirk Herbstreit gently correcting him was very funny. Herbstreit saying “just short” as kindly as he could so he wouldn’t undercut his partner in the booth took the moment to the next level. I suppose in the context of planet Earth, 8 yards could be considered “just short.”
It happens. There’s a lot going on during a football game.
• Fox’s broadcast of Texas Tech’s win over Oklahoma required viewers to piece together why the Sooners were beginning a drive on their own 7 rather than the 30 after a kick return. Rather than air officials announcing a penalty, the broadcast went to commercial. I haven’t seen that before.
FS1 went to break rather than airing the penalty call that you can hear in the background. Viewers think Oklahoma has it at the 30.
Come back from break and announcers don’t mention anything for 40 seconds as to why Sooners are starting on their 7 yard line. pic.twitter.com/YyvYF3sb6j
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) November 27, 2022
Was it another instance of Fox’s insistence on using remote announcing booths for games or is there another reason? It’s hard to tell for sure, but it’s hard to imagine an on-site producer and booth allowing the broadcast to cut away while a penalty was being announced. Either way, once again: Viewers lose.
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• Iowa quarterback Alex Padilla’s late-game heroics on a desperation throw downfield would have been a sight to see. Instead, viewers were treated to an incredible catch off-screen when cameras lingered on Padilla as he trotted out of bounds and didn’t follow the ball. It was a key play in the game and surely an honest mistake by the camera man, but — pardon the pun — it really dropped the ball in the moment.
At least officials later ruled the incredible catch incomplete after the receiver failed to get a foot inbounds. So technically the broadcast failed to air an incompletion.
• Very good work from CBS’ Jenny Dell to get the story of why Nick Saban’s face was bruised and bleeding very quickly, if not before, the broadcast aired a shot of him.
A player’s shoulder pad clipped his face, but game broadcasts can’t show the most famous person in a sport with a bloodied face and not explain what happened. Dell allowed Gary Danielson and Brad Nessler to know what was up very quickly. That’s serving viewers.
• We’ve highlighted SEC Nation’s penchant for having fun here before, and the show did it again Saturday, honoring Saban with a mock “Aight” award as a tribute to his love for the phrase. They even got a decent one-liner out of Saban, as well as a smile.
Nick Saban's response to receiving the "Aight" award is pure gold 😂@MartySmithESPN | @ESPNMcGee pic.twitter.com/alRW84EDC8
— SEC Network (@SECNetwork) November 26, 2022
• A few highlights from the final “College Gameday” of the year on a campus:
The crew trying to complete a coaches confidential segment and discuss anonymous coach quotes with a non-working screen was the beauty of live television. You never know what’s going to happen. Rece Davis and the crew made the best of flying blind.
Jen Lada’s story on the origin of Wisconsin’s Jump Around tradition was one of the best stories of the season. Telling an origin story I bet few outside of Madison knew (plus finding the footage from the very first Jump Around) is one thing. Taking it to the next level and going with Everlast for his first time to participate in the tradition is another.
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And I can’t be the only person who didn’t realize Everlast was in House of Pain … am I? I fear I might be.
For 25 years, House of Pain's 'Jump Around' has been one of the best traditions at @BadgerFootball and in college football.
Until this season, Everlast had never experienced it in person. pic.twitter.com/CX042vwFuY
— College GameDay (@CollegeGameDay) November 26, 2022
Getting new Nebraska head coach Matt Rhule on Gameday from Cape May, N.J., was a shrewd move by Nebraska and ESPN. Not a bad stage for his first interview as the new head Huskers boss.
• This was a nice touch from “Big Noon Kickoff.”
Today, he's Urban Eyer. pic.twitter.com/vc0Tq60qCB
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) November 26, 2022
Flaming Hot Take of the Week: Lee Corso, ESPN
First, it has been great to see Corso back on the Gameday desk the past two weeks and even better to welcome his mascot picks at the end of the show. I was busy in Charlottesville last weekend so we didn’t have this column on the week he actually returned, but I caught his pick.
On Saturday, he took Texas A&M to “upset the Tigers and make their season” as 10-point underdogs to LSU.
“It’s only natural the Tigers are looking forward to Georgia,” he said.
Maybe that was the case, but the Tigers looked like a mess, and the Aggies pulled off a shocking 38-23 upset and stormed the field after the game for the lone bright spot in a difficult season.
Freezing Cold Take(s) of the Week: Herbstreit and Desmond Howard, ESPN
Herbstreit and Howard took Vanderbilt as their Superdog as a 14-point underdog. Herbstreit also intimated earlier in the week that Tennessee would go on the road and lose.
Instead, Tennessee beat Vanderbilt 56-0 in Nashville, despite consistent rain throughout the night.
(Photo: Justin Ford / Getty Images)
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