Pete Golding expected to be named permanent Ole Miss head coach

Less than 24 hours after news of Lane Kiffin’s departure began to leak on social media, Ole Miss is expected to elevate defensive coordinator Pete Golding to its head coach position.

ESPN’s Pete Thamel reported the news Sunday afternoon on X, and videos surfaced after the team meeting at the Manning Center of players shouting “It’s the Pete Golding Era!”

Golding has been the Ole Miss DC since 2023 when he left from Alabama in the same role. His defenses while at Ole Miss have been some of the best in this century and reclaimed some of the Landshark mentality it lost since 2016.

The 41-year-old Louisiana native graduated from Delta State University where he played football all four years. He has been recruiting the state of Mississippi for well over a decade with stints at Southern Miss, UT-San Antonio, and the aforementioned Alabama.

Clearly, there’s no contract details, and this report may be premature as far as a long term solution for the football program. However, when you have players talking about going to the natty after his first meeting, I’d say Golding had control of the room and some immediate buy-in.

While College Football Playoff rankings will not be final until Dec. 7, it is presumed Ole Miss (11-1, 7-1 SEC) will sit in the top eight teams in the country and host a playoff game in Oxford at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium. Currently, the Rebels sit at No. 7 with a potential first round game against Alabama, but with looming conference championship games, there is still football to be played and rankings to be sorted out.