RGTV: Lane Kiffin discusses Ole Miss' win over Arkansas

OXFORD -- Ole Miss held off Arkansas in dramatic fashion, 52-51, Saturday at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium.

Afterwards, Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin met with the media to discuss the victory. Here's a transcript:

KIFFIN: Alright so 52-51, you know great outcome that we won you know but also you know there's a process that you want to play well and we did not obviously in certain areas, we had a chance to win the game on offense with about five minutes left but yeah they went for two and obviously we stop them on that so. We stopped them on one play in the second half so that’s a good thing. It was at the right time but you know we got a lot of work to do obviously there's some discouraging parts when you know 676 yards you give up to an offense that didn't score last week, but I think when you want a championship program you don't sit here and say everything's great just because you win a game because one play goes your way. So, there are some good things, I thought that we played good first half defense. The quarterback, you know our theme was put everything you have into each play, and he did that, lead by example because the guy put everything into it. Every time he had the ball in his hands, almost rushed for 100 yards against a hard run defense you know when you get hit by them, it hurts. Second best pass defense coming in in the country and the guy was almost 400 yards total. We made some plays outside, which is what eventually when you keep running the ball happens. I wouldn't have guessed the score but it is what it is, we won and we've got a lot of work to do, but it's a lot better to have a lot of work to do and win versus having a lot of work to do and not winning. You can be on the other side of the last play. So, hats off to them, the quarterback played really physical, kept plays alive and that good receiver you know they chunked it up to him and he went over us and got it a couple times so. Good win, let’s go back and get better and get healthy too, you know we played without three offensive starters. Tailback, the left guard and a receiver were all out and Springer was still out was obviously which is key to our scheme and the defense that we play.

Q: How big was it for Matt to play the way he did considering how he played against Arkansas last year?

KIFFIN: You know this wasn't about this week getting ready to play this defense, this was 12 months. So, you know when you get embarrassed like we did a year ago at least me. you know offensively we're gonna try everything we can to figure out how to how to beat you so that was 12 months of different unusual run game planning you know double moves on the safeties versus certain splits. I think that's why you probably saw so much excitement from myself and him you know during the game because things were hitting that were schematical things that we had worked on so it was stuff that has ever been run before against them, that we just took an offseason to say alright you know what if we did these things. We studied what hurt Iowa State in the Big 12 as a similar defense. That’s where you saw some of those runs with Snoop had different blocking schemes, and the backs did good. You went from 12 months ago seven turnovers and a fumbled snap on a fourth and one so basically eight turnovers to none this year, and I'm sure people weren't happy we didn’t make the fourth down, but we got the other four. That’s part of it, I think that fourth down that ended up being a touchdown was big because we'd already been stopped on the fourth down, and so it was like we better make this one, so good job by the players picking that up and turning it into seven points.

Q: What do you say the defense after they give up that touchdown right before the two point conversion?

KIFFIN: Well I think as you guys know in the postgame interview on the field you’re not going to get coach speak. So I could say we rose to the occasion and all that, but we let them go right down the field. You know we got to make plays in those situations, you know it's a young quarterback like that it was almost like everything just kept happening, we get a tackle it's a horse collar, we stopped the play and there's one second left, you know and then the guy kind of stops his route and sneaks into the back of the end zone and scores with one second left. You know good play by him. The initial part of the route was covered so good play by him and the quarterback. I’m usually a positive guy, but it was like what else could go wrong and then I see the flag you know we stopped them on the two point and I see Keith, he's running out there I grabbed him tried to bring him back so we don’t get a penalty, but he already knew there was a lineman downfield, soyou know it'll probably be one of those things that are you're so close to losing. I felt like what was going to happen is it wasn't going to go down to two points so at least we were going to be in control offensively and felt like we still have some plays you know we could win in over time, but they went for the two point with no time and you're like this is out of our hands we’ve got no control over this, so it got a little scary there for a second.

Q: Impressions on Snoop’s performance today?

KIFFIN: Great job as he's done whenever he gets his opportunities. My assistant already has a sign up because she’s. been saying for two weeks that we don’t play him enough and so the sign was already up on my door so she's happy. I think as you look at this you know what's unique versus in very tough defense who’s very physical and you’ve got six yards total of lost rushing on 47 rush attempts. You’ve got to do that. So you can get to fourth and close against them. Otherwise, you can deal with drop eight all day so you got to be efficient like that.

Q: How do you balance having 67 or so seconds left with just trying to score any opportunity you get?

KIFFIN: When we slow down in short yardage you’ve seen what happens, like the fourth and one, so if we can't go fast it gets a lot harder because they get to lineup, so it's why you see us go fast on a big play. It wasn't like it was going to three point game either it's going to seven so you'd sure like to think with like 51 seconds we can stop them. Some strange stats in the game, they went eight for eight in the red zone and we go three for three and we win the game.

Q: Last week you said the issues with run defenses weren’t schematic but after two straight games of teams running the football with so much success what’s your feeling on the run defense?

KIFFIN: Well that kind of says it’s a schematical issue because they do the same thing and there was 674 yards rushing you know both teams did a good job running the ball, both quarterbacks ran the ball well, you know both had almost 100 yards rushing each. We need to get better and play better. We need to get Springer back he’s the key guy out there in our scheme.

Q: What impressed you the most about the offensive effort in the run game?

KIFFIN: I think the assistant coaches did a really good job and like I said it was a 12 month process. They’re going to make it hard in the passing game and they’re going to make it hard between the tackles. They’re better than they were a year ago too because they got three transfer defensive linemen that start for them. We did a really good job of using unusual runs that attack the 4 I’s where they play them. We finished runs and gave them some run fit issues. We blocked number one who comes down and is slotted high. The players executed it well.

Q: What’s the biggest thing you can see that your team needs to improve on defensively?

KIFFIN: They were obviously going to throw the ball to Burks especially when they went down by seven, and it was frustrating because we’d work our way down there and then they’d just throw him a jump ball two times in a row. Our play at corner was not good in the run game or the pass game. Our play out there needs to be better and we’ve got some older players out there that need to play better.

Q: Would you have gone for two in the situation that Arkansas was in?

KIFFIN: As you guys know we go through all that and it’s constantly moving during the game. You’re at home and you’re a slight favorite so the analytics would tell you to kick because over more plays we’re supposed to be better. That’s analytics. When you’re an underdog on the road you probably go for two and that may have been what they were thinking especially in a high scoring game. We had used our two point play, obviously we had others but we had used the one we liked the most, so I told the staff about halfway through the fourth that if we got in that spot we were going to kick and let the quarterback keep finding ways to score.