(Justin Ford/Getty Images North America/TNS)Mike Bianchi, Orlando SentinelSat, November 29, 2025 at 10:30 AM UTC·4 min readORLANDO, Fla. — Gator Nation, brace yourselves.
Lane Kiffin, according to sources, has turned down Florida, and UF fans aren’t merely disappointed.
They feel betrayed.
They feel vacuumed-out, like all the hope that had inflated over the past two weeks suddenly evaporated into a chilly weekend like a candle snuffed out after everybody’s gone home and the Thanksgiving dinner table has been cleared.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementBecause once you fall in love with the idea of Lane Kiffin, everybody else feels like eating at Waffle House when you’d already imagined dinner at Bern’s Steak House.
Nothing against Louisville’s Jeff Brohm, Georgia Tech’s Brent Key, Washington’s Jedd Fisch. Tulane’s Jon Sumrall or any of the others — all good coaches, maybe even great. But after the fan base convinced itself Kiffin was destiny, that fate was aligning, that the visor was returning — anything else feels like a cheap prize in a box of cereal.
Here’s the raw truth:
With Kiffin saying no, athletic director Scott Stricklin isn’t walking back into the good graces of the fan base anytime soon.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementThis hiring cycle is his do-or-die moment.
Land Kiffin and Stricklin saved his reputation.
Miss and watch your remaining support dissolve like cotton candy in a rainstorm.
Stricklin hired Dan Mullen and Billy Napier — two lightning rods of disappointment — and now he stares at his third strike.
He knows it.
Fans know it.
Boosters know it.
Kiffin was his grand slam attempt.
And it apparently has landed foul.
Florida fans didn’t just want Kiffin.
They needed him.
They needed his irreverence, swagger, trash-talk, entertainment value, originality.
They needed his recruiting juice.
They needed his Spurrier-esque refusal to fear anyone.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementThey needed a coach who felt bigger than the program — because Florida hasn’t felt big in years.
And when the Lane Train came barreling down the tracks, Gainesville threw its bags aboard without waiting for confirmation it was stopping.
It didn’t stop.
And the crash of disappointment is seismic.
Who knows what Kiffin’s ultimate decision will be: Will he take the LSU job? Will he take an NFL job?
Personally, I hope he stays at Ole Miss.
As much as I would love to see him coaching in Gainesville, staying at Ole Miss would be both admirable and refreshing.
Refreshing that a coach chooses a smaller place over a bigger name.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementRefreshing that loyalty still means something in this rootless, rudderless sport.
Refreshing that a long-dismissed program can hold onto its star.
It’s also a sign of how today’s game works:
Money matters.
NIL matters.
Booster collectives matter.
Brand logos matter less than bank accounts.
If Kiffin stays at Ole Miss, it would reflect the democratization of college football.
But Florida fans don’t care about the morality of it.
They care that they didn’t get him.
Because they wanted the showman.
They wanted the spark.
They wanted someone who made Florida feel important again.
Brent Key may be rising.
Jedd Fisch and Jeff Brohm may scheme circles around half the SEC.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementJon Sumrall may be a quietly ascending star.
But none of them sell hope like Kiffin.
None light the fuse Gator Nation craves.
Anything short of Lane Kiffin is framed as failure.
The absurd part?
Florida was likely ready to pay him $100 million or maybe $150 million.
The Gators were probably ready to break the bank, break precedent, break the buyout market again.
College football money is a joke — a reckless carnival of desperation — and UF likely dove headfirst into the deep end.
And yet …
Kiffin still said no.
Which leaves the Gators with a problem.
Once you believe your soulmate is walking through the door, how do you get excited about anyone else?
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementNo matter who the Gators hire, it will be portrayed as if they settled, as if they missed the Lane Train.
That’s the risk of aiming high. It means the fall is farther.
No matter if he stays at Ole Miss out of loyalty, chooses LSU’s talent and resources or decides to go coach against the best of the best in the NFL, Gator Nation still takes it personally.
Because Kiffin wasn’t just a candidate.
He was the identity reboot Florida wanted; the cultural energy they’ve lacked since Steve Spurrier’s smirk and Urban Meyer’s scowl.
And that dream has died.
And, with it, Gator Nation spirals into existential interrogation:
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement— Are we still a top-tier job?
— Are we still attractive?
— Are we still feared?
— Are we still Florida?
And the scariest one of all:
— What if we’re Nebraska with palm trees?
The next coach might be great.
He might win big.
He might resurrect the program.
But he will always be the man hired after Florida struck out on Lane Kiffin.
And that asterisk — fair or not — hangs over the Stricklin era.
Because the heart wants what it wants.
And Florida wanted Lane Kiffin.
With him saying no, the mourning begins.
And Florida football wakes up once again to the harsh dawn of what it has become:
A once-mighty empire still searching for the man who can bring back the magic — and now forced to settle for someone who isn’t Lane Kiffin.
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