Oxford, Mississippi was hammered by one of the worst ice storms in state history on Saturday afternoon into Sunday morning, which left thousands of residents without power and water for days on end. Chris Marler of ESPN and LouisianaSports.net thought it would be a good time to make a joke about Lane Kiffin.
It was in extremely poor taste.
The reinvigorated rivalry between Ole Miss and LSU just took another turn. And the worst part is that the people of Oxford don’t even know they were made the butt of the uncouth quip because they don’t have access to social media because of the historic weather event. Marler kicked them in the gut while they were down. Shameful.
Oxford, Mississippi is covered in ice.
Snow days are fun. Especially in college in the south. All of the students get together, drink a few beers, throw a few snowballs and ride their mattresses or any other semi-sleddable object down the nearest hill.
This was not a snow day. This was a serious weather event that will take months, if not years to fully recover.
Freezing rain, sleet and ice fell directly on top of Oxford, Mississippi for more than 12 hours straight. Somebody shook the snow globe town that is home to the University of Mississippi, a.k.a Ole Miss.
If you have not experienced this kind of storm, you cannot fully understand.
Every single inch of the city remains covered in a thick layer of ice more than 36 hours after the storm. Everything, and I mean everything, is completely iced over. Trees, light posts, basketball hoops, cars, houses, power lines, roads— everything. It’s all ice.
Just a half-inch of ice accumulation on power lines and/or tree branches can add approximately 500 pounds of weight. That causes those lines and trees to fall. Transformers explode. Out goes the power.
And to make matters worse, temperatures are not expected to get above 32º until Tuesday afternoon at the earliest. The ice is not going to melt.
The entire city is shut down on a shelter-in-place order. Classes are canceled through Wednesday. Most people are stuck inside without power. Some people are also without water.
To put the storm in perspective, even Waffle House was not open. It was only able to take to-go orders for walk-ins on a limited menu as of Sunday evening. That’s how you know.
Images of the historic winter storm are devastating.
To describe the conditions as dangerous would be understated. Trees are down all over the city.
I am very concerned for the people of northern Mississippi tonight with so many power outages and a forecast low temperature of 10F. The temperature is plummeting behind one of the worst ice storms to ever hit the region pic.twitter.com/gObFGBac3I
— Reed Timmer, PhD (@ReedTimmerUSA) January 25, 2026
They fell across the roads, on houses, cars, power lines and businesses. The trees stand bare.
The branches (and even the roots) could not handle the weight of the ice.
Transformers are exploding in the extreme temperatures.
We're in the end times 😭😭 pic.twitter.com/ekEFFset3t
— Barstool Ole Miss (@BarstoolOleMiss) January 26, 2026
The Grove took a direct hit.
Video from Grove Loop in Oxford on the @OleMiss campus.
— Lee Ann Thigpen (@Leeleefix) January 25, 2026
Taken by my son.
Lot of damage 😩😩😩 pic.twitter.com/8O3BNU246G
Northeast Mississippi is in rough shape.
The people of Oxford need help.
Many residents and students are trapped in their homes without heat. Some are without water. Food is limited after the grocery stores were ransacked earlier in the week. A state of emergency was declared for a reason.
Chris Marler wants to make jokes.
The tension between Ole Miss and LSU is at an all-time high and Lane Kiffin is to blame. The rivalry between these two former SEC West programs has never been more intense.
That is not an excuse to laugh at people who are in need. Chris Marler apparently disagrees. He found humor in the catastrophic ice storm that wrecked Oxford, Mississippi. He cracked a joke about the severe damage to The Square.
Marler, who works for ESPN and LouisanaSports.net, quipped that the weather was Kiffin’s fault.
Meanwhile, countless people — many of them elderly — are trapped inside their homes without power and/or water. They cannot crack a joke on social media because they have to save all of their phone battery for emergency communications. They do not have WiFi to read Marler’s post. It is a dire situation that stems from a natural disaster.
Marler doesn’t care. He made the conscious decision to make a joke about a historic weather event from the comfort of his own home with water, power and heat. All for clout on the internet.
And to make matters worse, when somebody pushed back on his joke, Marler did not apologize. In fact, he doubled down. “All time overreaction,” he responded. Nasty work.