Sydney Thomas, the ring girl who went viral during the Jake Paul vs. Mike Tyson boxing match on Netflix last year, name dropped the college football coach who slid into her DMs.
Thomas, 21, revealed in January that “an SEC football team coach” messaged her shortly after the fight.
While appearing on the Netflix reality series Inside: USA, which is streaming now, Thomas was asked about “the craziest celebrity to hit on you.”
“I’d say Lane Kiffin, another SEC football coach,” said Thomas, who graduated from the University of Alabama earlier this year. “Slid in with ‘Roll Tide,’ and he’s the coach of Ole Miss.”
Rivalry week between Ole Miss and LSU just got a little awkward in the Kiffin household. Landry Kiffin, the oldest daughter of Ole Miss head football coach Lane Kiffin, hard launched a relationship with LSU football player Whit Weeks on Monday, September 22, just days before Ole Miss and LSU play on Saturday, September 27. […]
Kiffin, 50, has been the head football coach at Ole Miss since 2020. He was the offensive coordinator at Alabama from 2014 to 2016.
The coach was married to his wife, Layla Kiffin, for 12 years before they got divorced in 2016. However, the couple has recently sparked reconciliation rumors thanks to a series of social media posts.
When asked about the status of his relationship with his ex-wife in April, Lane told USA Today, “Even though there are reports, I really don’t think I want to comment on this. I really don’t want to put anything in quotation marks.”
Thomas first hinted at a football coach getting into her DMs during an appearance on the “Like a Farmer Podcast” in January.
“I have some names, I just don’t know that I want to expose them,” Thomas said when asked about “the biggest celebrity” who had messaged her after the Paul-Tyson fight.
Thomas added, “We’ll just say this. It was from another SEC football team coach. They just DM’d me ‘Roll Tide.’ I’m not going to say what coach it was, but they’re an Alabama fan now at least. We’ll let everyone else figure out who it was.”
Sydney Thomas. NETFLIX
“Roll Tide” is the famous rallying cry used by Alabama fans, a reference to the school’s nickname, the Crimson Tide.
In an exclusive interview with Us Weekly in November, Thomas said her Instagram DMs had been “extremely flooded” in the days after the boxing match.
“There’s definitely been some pretty big names and brands that have reached out,” she said.
While Thomas noted she didn’t want to disclose any of the names for “privacy reasons,” she joked that “the DMs and all that are just going crazy right now.”
It didn’t take long after the Paul-Tyson fight, which streamed live on Netflix, for Thomas to realize her life had changed.
“I woke up and saw how my followers had gone up, and then saw all the news articles that had been written about me,” Thomas told Us. “I refreshed my feed and it was just pictures of me and memes and everything. I think that was the moment for me where I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, like I really am going viral.’”
Sydney Thomas, the ring girl who went viral during the Jake Paul–Mike Tyson fight, is making sure to strike while the iron is hot. After her in-ring appearance at the highly-anticipated Netflix boxing match on Friday, November 15 caused many viewers to sit up in their chairs, Thomas, 21, is taking meetings with Hollywood hotshots. […]
She added, “It is very overwhelming. But at the same time, I’m also very blessed and very grateful. You know, what a problem to have.”
Thomas used the instant fame to sign with high-power agency CAA, which led to her getting cast on Netflix’s Inside: USA.
“Inside: USA is a one-of-a-kind, high-stakes reality show that spans a week and features 12 contestants battling it out for $1 million,” the streamer described. “The only catch is that they enter the house with nothing but the clothes on their backs — everything inside costs a hefty price that’s directly deducted from the prize pot.”
The cast also features Bre Tiesi, Mark Estes, Max Fosh, Ekin-Su Cülcüloğlu, Alissa Violet, Dwight Howard and more.
