By GLENN GUILBEAU, Tiger Rag Editor
One of the obstacles LSU athletic director Verge Ausberry had to overcome before hiring Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin was the perception that many hands were all over the LSU football program – from Governor Jeff Landry to the LSU Board of Supervisors and the athletic director’s office.
When you start 2nd guessing yourself, then subconsciously channeling your inner Cajun Man, @Coach_EdOrgeron , then you know LSU was right decision.https://t.co/dxOk82eoOn
— Glenn Guilbeau (@SportBeatTweet) December 2, 2025
Former LSU athletic director Scott Woodward, for example, pushed former coach Ed Orgeron to hire Bo Pelini as defensive coordinator after the Tigers lost DC Dave Aranda following the 15-0 national championship season in 2019. Pelini fielded one of the worst defenses in LSU history in 2020, and Orgeron was fired in 2021. Woodward also tried to tell former coach Brian Kelly whom he should fire or keep.
Kiffin got the message early that would not happen with Ausberry, who replaced Woodward after his firing last month.
Asked what Ausberry said to him the first time they talked about the LSU job that was exactly what he wanted to hear, Kiffin paused at his press conference on Monday and said:
“I’m going to leave you alone and let you coach the team,” Kiffin said, quoting Ausberry. “I like when I hear that. ‘We’re going to give you everything to win, and I’m going to leave you alone. Go coach the team and bring us championships.'”
And that was about it.
“Verge isn’t really long-winded in those meetings, as some other people,” Kiffin said. “And he gets right to the point. I really like that. He sparked my interest from the time I talked to him.”
And Kiffin was soon off and running as LSU’s coach as of Sunday night, hiring a staff and recruiting with the first day of the early signing period on Wednesday.
“Our program here at LSU will be designed top to bottom to be the number one destination for elite players in all of America,” Kiffin promised. “That’s why we’re here. Our immediate priority is assembling the best staff in the country and securing top talent. We have everything to bring championship football back to LSU. It’s time for LSU to take its place back as the best program in all of college football, and that’s what we’re here to do.”
It’s over. Lane Kiffin is LSU’s next football coach. Press conference introducing him set for Monday at LSU.https://t.co/kTRsVE78Of
— Glenn Guilbeau (@SportBeatTweet) November 30, 2025
Kiffin said he took the advice of his former coaches as an assistant – USC’s Pete Carroll and Alabama’s Nick Saban – as well as his agent Jimmy Sexton, who has been Saban’s agent since Saban left Michigan State for LSU in 1999 and won LSU’s first national title since 1958 in the 2003 season.
Two more coaches followed Saban with national championships – Les Miles in the 2007 season and Orgeron in the 2019 season. Miles also reached a second national championship game with a 13-0 season and SEC championship in 2011 with a 9-6 overtime win as the No. 1 team at No. 2 Alabama in a Game of the Century, but he lost the title in the rematch with Alabama and Saban.
“They all said, ‘Man, you are going to regret it, if you don’t take the shot and don’t go to LSU. It’s the best job in America with the best resources to win it,'” Kiffin said. “It’s obviously been done here before by a number of people.”
If Kiffin wins a national title, he will be the fifth LSU coach to do so. Paul Dietzel was the first in 1958.
“What a great day to be a Tiger – a beautiful day,” Ausberry said as he introduced Kiffin Monday. “I can honestly tell you from the moment we determined that a coaching change would be necessary (on Oct. 26), the first name on everyone’s lips was Lane Kiffin. We performed due diligence on several other coaches, but the name none of us could shake was Lane. We believed that LSU is the place he may be willing to come to. We believed it would be a perfect fit for someone like him.”
Kiffin, 50, comes to LSU as the most accomplished head coach ever hired by LSU on the day of the hiring. Among LSU’s previous successful head coaches, Dietzel (1955-61) and Charles McClendon (1962-1979) were assistant coaches before becoming LSU’s head coach. Bill Arnsparger (1984-86) was 7-28 with the New York Giants in his only job as a head coach before LSU.
Saban was 48 when LSU hired him after the 1999 season, and his best two seasons as a head coach were 9-2 campaigns at Michigan State and Toledo. Miles’ best season was 9-4 in 2003 at Oklahoma State. Orgeron was 10-25 in three seasons at Ole Miss and 11-4 as an interim coach at USC and LSU.
Kiffin, 50, will be in his sixth head coaching job at LSU. He had four double-digit win seasons in his last five years at Ole Miss, which had only two 10-win seasons from 1972 through 2020. Kiffin was the first coach in Ole Miss history to win 10 regular season games in 2021 and first to win 11 in the regular season this year.
And he left Ole Miss at 11-1 overall and 7-1 in the SEC with a No. 7 ranking and expecting its first College Football Playoff berth ever with a home game in the first round. The Rebels are within range of its first national championship since 1960 when the Football Writers Association of America crowned the 10-0-1 Rebels No. 1.
“We told Lane that LSU was not just a place to come to win games,” Ausberry said. “He has done that already. We told him it was a place to come to contend for national championships year in and year out. We promised him the resources to recruit and develop the best players in the country. We promised him a student body and a fan base that demands success. And we promised him a state and a community that will welcome him and his family that was eager to become, with his leadership, legendary.”
Now, like Nick Saban before him, stay out of his way.
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