Lane Kiffin is still a coach. He just won't be voting in the coaches poll this season.

After it was discovered that Kiffin selected his own Trojans as the no. 1 team in the country heading into the season, Kiffin has since relinquished his membership on the voting panel for this season.

"It is an opportunity and responsibility that I do not take lightly," Kiffin said in a letter to USA Today and Grant Teaff -- executive director of the American Football Coaches Association. "However, I find it necessary to relinquish my voting status."

The controversy has raised concerns about USA Today's conflict of interest as the means in which the American Football Coaches Association's poll is administered. The votes are supposed to be kept confidential. USC had this to say in a statement:

"...The fact that the leadership of the American Football Coaches Association, which tasks USA Today to administer its poll, joined with the poll administrators from USA Today to decide to breach that confidentiality by providing a reporter a coach's vote in its preseason poll is disappointing and attacks the integrity of the poll. Further, that the reporter who was given this information represents the very organization that conducts the poll is a conflict of journalistic interest."

USC received 19 first-place votes to finish No. 3 in the preseason poll.