Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin believes that players in conferences that have decided against fall sports should be able to transfer to a school that still intends to play without penalty.

"Kids are having their schools or their conferences deciding to shut down, so they can't play, and a lot of them have a lot of money on the line with the next level, or they just want to play their last year," Kiffin told the SEC Network on Wednesday. "So it's really unfortunate that the NCAA is not allowing them to transfer and be eligible immediately. We're being told that won't even go into a waiver process, so I feel really bad for those kids. It's not their fault. Why can't they come play somewhere? That doesn't make any sense to me."

The Big Ten and Pac-12, both Power 5 conferences, announced last week that fall sports were cancelled due to the ongoing coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. The remaining three conferences - the Big 12, ACC and Kiffin's SEC - are going ahead with their football seasons, set to get underway next month.

With outbreaks occurring on campuses across the country, including at Notre Dame and North Carolina, Kiffin believes that his players are at highest risk when they're not with their teams.

"The big challenge is not when they're with us," he said. "The big challenge is when they're away from us and dealing with this, and [they're] doing a good job because the college environment is not doing a very good job of it and the environment in general."

Ole Miss is set to kick off its 10-game, conference-only schedule on Sept. 16 against Florida.