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Making the morning rounds.
Rarely in coaching history has a man unleashed so much anger and ink while accomplishing so little …
(Warning: Clip containts some potentially NSFW chanting.)
• Good riddance, snake. Tuesday night’s anti-Lane Kiffin rage wasn’t limited to Tennessee students spewing obscenities and setting Kiffin gear on fire on campus. His now-former players spoke out, too, notably outgoing center Josh McNeill, who nearly quit in the middle of his final season amid tensions with Kiffin and opened up with both barrels Tuesday to his friend and diehard Vol fan Clay Travis on AOL FanHouse, accusing Kiffin of trying to turn Tennessee into “the USC of the South”: “Coach Kiffin cared about Tennessee traditions less than the worst Vol hater in the state of Alabama. That man’s a snake.” [AOL FanHouse]
The outgoing staff didn’t win any friends during Kiffin’s hastily-assembled farewell meeting with the team, either, where USC-bound assistant Ed Orgeron was overheard trying to sway incoming recruits to follow him and Kiffin to Los Angeles — other reports say Coach O even told a few early enrollees at UT to stay home from class today, the start of the spring semester — and a few players said they walked out of the meeting before Kiffin was finished.
• Welcome home, lightweight. The welcoming wagon isn’t going to be much warmer from the proudly hard-to-impress Los Angeles media: The L.A. Times’ old hand, Bill Plaschke, sums up the general opinion when he writes that USC athletic director Mike Garrett “lost his mind” in hiring “a lightweight for a heavyweight job” — this is the same coach, after all, whose team lost to outmanned UCLA in Knoxville just four months ago. [L.A. Times]
Elsewhere, snarkier members of the USC media horde have already begun the Kiffin controversy pool: How long will it take the new boss to say something that sends everyone into a lather? When is his first press conference? Today? I’d take today. [L.A. Daily News]
• Next man up (BOOM!). There’s hardly been time to recover from the shock of Kiffin’s departure long enough to put together a list of possible replacements at Tennessee, but every early guess you find this morning is certain to have Will Muschamp at the top. The Texas defensive coordinator was immediately floated as the Vols’ top choice, but Longhorn fans don’t seem very worried ($) — early word out of Austin suggests Muschamp is already beginning to build UT in his own image, and no one there seems to believe he would give up his coach-in-waiting status behind Mack Brown for a shot at any SEC job outside of Florida or maybe Georgia. [Birmingham News, Orangebloods]
Quickly … Texas Tech wants a judge to throw out former coach Mike Leach’s lawsuit for wrongful termination. … Notre Dame receiver Michael Floyd was cited for underage drinking following a fight earlier this month. … Skip Holtz remains a favorite for the South Florida job, but Jon Gruden a handful of former Tampa Bay players are stumping for Buccaneers special teams coach Rich Bisaccia. … NASCAR sponsor Aaron’s plans to commemorate Alabama’s BCS championship on its 00 car in an April race. … And possibly the angriest and most disgusting Kiffin hate video on the record to date.