As the college football regular season winds down, coaching rumors are only heating up. Virginia Tech and James Frank got hitched this week to take one big domino out of the cycle, but jobs like Florida, LSU, Auburn and several other major openings still remain. Lane Kiffin is the obvious top prize here, but as he puts on a side show, some schools might have to start looking into other options.
Florida appears to be doing just that. The Gators are heavily embroiled in the Lane Kiffin rumor mill themselves, but rather than wait on the charade, UF leadership is reportedly reaching out to other options, including perhaps the second-hottest name on the market among SEC teams, and that’s Jon Sumrall at Tulane. Zach Abolverdi of On3’s website, Gators Online, reported on Wednesday:
“UF plans to meet with Sumrall on Thursday about its head coaching position, according to a source close to the situation,” Abolverdi wrote. He added that not only has Sumrall set a meeting with Florida for this week, but he’s also made contact with the decision-makers over at Auburn.
“Sumrall, 43, is also a top candidate for the Auburn job,” Abolverdi added. “His representatives have exchanged numbers with Auburn, the source said.”
Mississippi Rebels head coach Lane Kiffin (left) and Tulane Green Wave head coach Jon Sumrall (right) / Petre Thomas-Imagn Images
By all indications, including Kiffin’s own refusal to deny interest in other jobs within the conference, Florida appears very much in the thick of the race to land Lane Kiffin’s talents for the 2026 football season and beyond. Now, whether he does end up in Gainesville remains, at best, a total shot in the dark.
According to the closest system we have for betting odds, Kalshi’s predictive trading market, Lane Kiffin remains the highest-valued option for next Gators head coach, with their metrics assigning a 54% chance of that move occurring. However, Sumrall isn’t too far behind with a 21-cent price and 21% chance, per Kalshi.
Perhaps Florida knows that Lane Kiffin is putting on a public display just to triumphantly return to Oxford — in a plot more successful than that of Roscoe Conkling in the Netflix historical mini-series Death By Lightning — and the Gators have already decided to quietly move on. Or, Florida could wait Kiffin out but be getting ahead of a potential Kiffin rejection by vetting their secondary options.
Either way, Florida is now certainly interested in Jon Sumrall and is meeting with him by Thursday. Even if the interview goes amazingly, you would think he also finishes out the season with a Tulane team that potentially makes the College Football Playoff.
