Updated: August 13, 2012, 8:42 AM ET
ESPN.com news servicesDid he, or didn't he? Will he, or won't he?
Lane Kiffin, a voting member for this season's USA Today college football poll for the first time, says he has pulled out -- after one vote for the preseason standings -- and won't continue to submit selections.
"It is an opportunity and responsibility that I do not take lightly," he said in a letter to USA Today and Grant Teaff, the executive director of the American Football Coaches Association. "However, I find it necessary to relinquish my voting status."
Kiffin, who according to the newspaper did not elaborate on his decision, told reporters last week he wouldn't select his USC Trojans as the No. 1 team, when, in fact, he did.
Kiffin now says he has given up his poll role in the aftermath of the controversy, unfurled when USA Today publicized Kiffin's vote Thursday to "set the record straight to protect the poll's integrity," two days after the coach made his proclamation.
Kiffin defended his vote to the newspaper by saying his players would have found out one way or another if he hadn't put the Trojans No. 1. Votes are normally kept confidential until the final poll of each year.
Asked about the poll after his Trojans scrimmaged at the L.A. Memorial Coliseum on Friday afternoon, Kiffin downplayed the issue and defended his original comments.
"Not a big deal. You guys asked me about RichRod and I was saying I wouldn't put us No. 1," Kiffin said, referring to Arizona coach Rich Rodriguez's assertion that he had put the Trojans at the top of his voting list. "I was saying that because of our issues with numbers, from (the perspective of) other people. Did I vote us No. 1? Yeah. I said that when they called me, before they even told me."
Information from ESPNLosAngeles.com's Pedro Moura was used in this report.
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