The arrivals of Mike Leach and Lane Kiffin in Mississippi just made the Egg Bowl a must-watch rivalry

Mike Leach is taking over at Mississippi State, and Ole Miss recently hired Lane Kiffin.

Mike Leach is leaving Washington State to take over as head coach for Mississippi State, USA TODAY Sports confirmed Thursday. This is huge news for the 58-year-old coach who’s famous for his air raid offense and is approaching two decades as a head coach.

Leach had been with the Cougars since the 2012 season after getting his first head coaching job in college at Texas Tech and spending 10 years with the Red Raiders. After finishing 11-2 in 2018, Washington State was 6-7 this year and closed the season with a loss to Air Force in the Cheez-It Bowl.

After a 6-7 2019 season, the Bulldogs fired Joe Moorhead Friday at the end of his second season with the program. Mississippi State lost in the Music City Bowl to Louisville in December.

Leach taking over means the SEC has yet another big-personality coach in the conference, particularly the SEC West. But while the always blunt and often amusing coach joins Alabama’s Nick Saban and LSU’s Ed Orgeron in that category, perhaps the most entertaining aspect of this news involves the program’s rivalry with Ole Miss, which recently hired Lane Kiffin.

The Egg Bowl rivalry game between the two teams is often wildly entertaining, sometimes regardless of the score. And even the most recent one in November ended in absurd fashion with a last-second touchdown, a penalty for a player mimicking a dog urinating on the field and a devastating missed extra point. (A dog urinating moment also occurred in the 2017 matchup too.)

So how could a game with a history of ridiculousness get even better? Pitting Leach against Kiffin is a great start. So mark your calendar because the first Egg Bowl with these two coaches is on Thanksgiving (November 26, 2020).

College football Twitter is rightfully pumped about this new element of the rivalry with Leach’s arrival at Mississippi State, and that even includes the former Alabama assistant and FAU coach.