OXFORD, Miss. — When Lane Kiffin walked off the field last December, his Ole Miss Rebels had just capped a 10-win season and sent a record eight players into the NFL Draft.
Now, as the summer heat settles over Oxford and college football’s transfer portal era reaches fever pitch, Kiffin faces a challenge that could define his legacy at Ole Miss.
He’s got to rebuild on the fly, without missing a beat.
Gone are first-round picks Walter Nolen and Jaxson Dart, the defensive cornerstone and the quarterback whose arm and poise brought the program to national relevance.
In their place stands sophomore Austin Simmons, a 19-year-old prodigy who completed his bachelor’s degree before most of his teammates finished their gen-eds.
Simmons, who reclassified from the 2025 high school class to jumpstart his collegiate career, carries both the hopes of the program and the weight of expectation on his broad shoulders.
“Simmons is the presumed starter for the Rebels in 2025,” as Sports Illustrated said, “having spent the last two seasons learning the system under Dart, Lane Kiffin, and Charlie Weis Jr..”
This is not the first time Kiffin has had to build from the ground up.
“I’m really excited,” Kiffin told local reporters as spring practice began. “Exciting for our university to be at that place this time of year. So best of luck to those teams and players.”
Kiffin has made a career out of wrangling chaos, but 2025 brings a unique kind of uncertainty along with opportunity.
At the heart of Ole Miss’s defensive resurgence lies linebacker Suntarine Perkins, a third-team All-SEC selection who tied for the team lead with 10.5 sacks and 14 tackles for loss last season.
Perkins’ athleticism and leadership set the tone for a unit that, despite losing top tackler Chris Paul to the NFL, returns significant experience in TJ Dottery and adds Marshall transfer Jaden Yates, whose 114 tackles led the Sun Belt Conference.
“Our linebacker room is one of our most experienced starting units,” Kiffin said this spring, highlighting the continuity that could give Ole Miss an edge in the SEC battles.
But the real story of the 2025 Rebels might be told through the air.
With Jaxson Dart off to the New York Giants and last season’s top three receivers in Tre Harris, Jordan Watkins, and Juice Wells all departed, the passing game is a blank slate.
Cayden Lee, who finished as the team’s third-leading receiver, is back and will anchor a receiver corps that looks radically different from a year ago.
Kiffin and his staff have mined the transfer portal for talent, bringing in De’Zhaun Stribling from Oklahoma State, Harrison Wallace from Penn State, Caleb Odom from Alabama, and Traylon Ray from West Virginia.
Sprinkle in five-star recruit Caleb Cunningham and four-star Winston Watkins, and the Rebels suddenly boast one of the deepest, if most unproven, groups in the SEC.
The tight end position, often an afterthought in Kiffin’s previous offenses, looms large for Simmons. Dae’Quan Wright returns after closing last season with seven straight games with a catch and a monster performance against Arkansas (nine receptions, 99 yards, two touchdowns).
His new running mate, interestingly enough, is Razorback transfer Luke Hasz, addsing another dynamic weapon after posting 324 yards receiving in 2024.
“The talent is there for Simmons to lean on his tight ends,” the Clarion Ledger said and with a first-year starter at quarterback, dependable targets over the middle could be crucial.
Nationally, expectations remain high, if slightly muted.
ESPN’s future power rankings slot Ole Miss at No. 16 for the 2025-26 window, sixth among SEC teams and well within the expanded playoff conversation.
The Rebels’ recruiting class is ranked as high as 16th nationally, with a transfer portal group that rivals any in the country. The challenge, as ever in Oxford, is translating promise into performance.
Kiffin’s approach to roster management reflects the new realities of college football. Ole Miss added at least 24 transfers in the first portal window, including not just headline names but depth pieces across the roster.
This willingness to embrace change and sell a vision of immediate opportunity has been central to the program’s recent success.
“Where the 2025-26 Ole Miss football roster stands,” Red Cup Rebellion wrote in January, “is a testament to the staff’s ability to reload, not just rebuild.”
There are questions, of course.
• How will Simmons handle the pressure of replacing Dart, one of the most productive quarterbacks in school history?
• Can Perkins and Dottery anchor a defense that must replace its emotional leaders?
• Will Ole Miss’s patchwork receiver group develop chemistry in time to navigate an SEC schedule that offers little room for error?
Around the SEC, some rival coaches have been dismissive of Kiffin’s transfer-heavy approach, but that skepticism has often faded by season’s end.
If there’s a theme to the 2025 Rebels, it’s transition and the refusal to blink in the face of it.
“You never know exactly how it’s going to come together,” Kiffin admitted after a spring practice session. “But I like the way our guys are working. There’s a hunger in this building, and we’re excited to show what we can do.”
Simmons’ own story mirrors that of his team being accelerated, ambitious, and unburdened by the past. He arrived in Oxford as a 17-year-old, having completed high school early and trained alongside NFL veterans.
“The quarterback trained with NFL players when he was 12, completed his high school coursework with a jaw-dropping 5.34 GPA at age 16 and left his Miami home to enroll at Ole Miss two years earlier than expected,” CBS Sports said.
If Simmons can steady the ship and if the influx of new talent finds its footing Ole Miss could once again be a threat in the SEC West, even as the conference’s balance of power continues to shift.
For now, Kiffin’s Rebels are defined by what they’ve lost, but the story of 2025 will be written by those who remain and those willing to seize their chance.
In Oxford, where the future is always just a Saturday away, that’s exactly how they like it.
