The college sports landscape has changed dramatically since the beginning of the NIL era, and the effects have specifically been seen in the college football world. For the big schools with the most money and the biggest alumni bases, it's been fantastic. They can make a pretty good recruiting pitch to any prospect. For smaller schools, it's a little bit harder, and they could end up being left in the dust. While Ole Miss football isn't typically discussed as a small college football program, the Rebels still do have some big dogs to compete with in the SEC. Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin recently spoke about some of the challenges he has faced with NIL during his time in Oxford.

“Extremely encouraged,” Lane Kiffin said in regards to a recent NIL collective, according to an article from Sports Illustrated. “I'm very real on good, bad, ugly. It's been awesome what the collective has done. I feel like Ole Miss is like the Green Bay Packers of college football, especially the SEC. Not the biggest town, most alumni. Them coming together like they have makes me think of Green Bay and shareholders with the team.”

That's a pretty good comparison by Kiffin. The good news for Ole Miss football fans is that Kiffin understands how important this kind of stuff is in the long run. He recognizes that it's adapt or die right now in college football, and he's doing everything he can to make sure Ole Miss is in a good spot.

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“Without that, we're not going anywhere,” Kiffin said. “I don't care how great assistant coaches you have, who your head coach is. You don't have this, you don't have resources, you don't win.”

Kiffin is right. If there are other teams that can guarantee recruits a lot of money if they come to their school, they're going to want to go there. That's just the way things will be. It's a slippery slope to navigate, but Kiffin has a good mindset about it.