For the first time in over a decade LSU football has a new head coach. Can Ed Orgeron turn the Tigers into championship contenders in 2017?
The last time an LSU team entered the season with someone other than Nick Saban or Les Miles as their head coach was 1999. That year Gerry DiNardo went 3-8. Now it’s coach Ed Orgeron’s turn. Does he have what it takes to take down the Alabama Crimson Tide and compete in one of the toughest divisions in college football?
LSU was 2-2 when they fired Miles a season ago. After Orgeron took the helm the Tigers finished 6-2. Their two losses came to SEC West Champion Alabama and SEC East Champion Florida by a combined 16 points. Not too shabby for an interim guy.
Orgeron’s final win of the year came in the Citrus Bowl on New Year’s Eve. The Tigers obliterated a Louisville team led by Heisman-winning quarterback Lamar Jackson. All of that was enough for the LSU administration to remove the interim tag and appoint Ogeron the full-time coach at LSU entering the 2017 season.
It’s been quite some time since Orgeron held a head coaching job, since 2007 in fact. That was his final year at Ole Miss. In three seasons in Oxford, Orgeron went 10-25. After he was relieved of his duties at Ole Miss, Orgeron would go on to be named the interim coach at USC in 2013 and in 2016 at LSU before taking the head coaching position this winter.
Will the Tigers be clamoring to bring back the Mad Hatter before season’s end? Can Coach O compete for and SEC title? It’s time to look at the roster that Orgeron has to work with in 2017 and make a few predictions.
Offense
Derrius Guice is one of the best players in college football today. He’s also the entirety of the LSU offense, or at least that seemed to be the case last season. As a backup to future NFL draft pick Leonard Fournette, Guice led the SEC in rushing last year. In fact, Guice was responsible for nearly one-third of all the yards gained by the Tigers in 2016.
That’s not sustainable if the Tigers are going to compete for an SEC championship. The better defenses in the conference know how to stop a one-dimensional team. That’s what happened last year against Alabama and Florida. The passing attack is going to have to take a step forward. New head coach Ed Orgeron hired the right man to get that done when he brought in Matt Canada from Pittsburgh.
Canada will be hard at work this offseason with quarterbacks Danny Etling and Myles Brennan. The starting job belongs to Etling, for now, but there seems to be a higher upside with the new freshman signee. Whomever gets the call will have their eyes focused in on wide receiver D.J. Chark.
The Tigers haven’t had a top 40 passing offense in a decade. They’re not going to magically turn into a spread offense over night, but they should take significant strides in 2017. If they don’t they’re going to have a hard time landing elite quarterback prospects in the future with no track record of development and no Les Miles to sweet talk them to Baton Rouge.
Defense
It’s possible that the Tigers have two future top 10 draft picks. Guice is one, and edge rusher Arden Key is the other. Key has already drawn comparisons to reigning No. 1 overall pick Myles Garrett. Some people have gone as far to say that Key could be better than Garrett as soon as this season.
More: Projected 2017 2-deep depth chart for the LSU Tigers
The rest of the Tiger front seven is equally dangerous. Devin White, an All-SEC freshman team selection a year ago, takes over the starting middle linebacker job. He’ll play right alongside Donnie Alexander, who saw his role increase last season with the injury to Kendall Beckwith.
That linebacking corps, combined with a sturdy defensive line featuring Greg Gilmore, Christian Lacouture, and Rashard Lawrence, made the Tigers’ defense one of the most suffocating units in the country in 2016. They finished 13th in the nation in rushing yards allowed per game. They were one of just five teams in the nation to surrender less than 1,410 total rushing yards last year.
The passing defense was equally stingy. The Tigers ranked 23rd in the nation in passing defense, but third in the SEC, ahead of the mighty Alabama Crimson Tide. Only one team in the nation, Florida, allowed fewer passing touchdowns than LSU. The Gators gave up eight scores through the air compared to LSU’s nine passing touchdowns allowed.
There will be new faces in 2017, but the strength of the Tigers defense will never be in question. Coach O has shown no signs of slowling down the recruiting momentum built up by Les Miles. As long as he keeps churning out top 10 classes, the LSU defense will be just fine.
Schedule and predictions
| WEEK | DATE | OPPONENT | LOCATION |
| 1 | Sept. 2 | vs. BYU | Houston, Tx. |
| 2 | Sept. 9 | vs. Chattanooga | Baton Rouge, La. |
| 3 | Sept. 16 | @ Mississippi State | Starkville, Ms. |
| 4 | Sept. 23 | vs. Syracuse | Baton Rouge, La. |
| 5 | Sept. 30 | vs. Troy | Baton Rouge, La. |
| 6 | Oct. 7 | @ Florida | Gainesville, Fl. |
| 7 | Oct. 14 | vs. Auburn | Baton Rouge, La. |
| 8 | Oct. 21 | @ Ole Miss | Oxford, Ms. |
| 9 | Oct. 28 | BYE WEEK | |
| 10 | Nov. 4 | @ Alabama | Tuscaloosa, Al. |
| 11 | Nov. 11 | vs. Arkansas | Baton Rouge, La. |
| 12 | Nov. 18 | @ Tennessee | Knoxville, Tn. |
| 13 | Nov. 25 | vs. Texas A&M | Baton Rouge, La. |
LSU opens up the season in Houston against the BYU Cougars. While they might not have as much swagger as the Tigers, the Cougars are going to be a scary team in 2017. Tiger fans ought to not count that as a win before the clock runs out. After that the team has a few “gimme” games before the meat of the SEC schedule begins in October against Florida.
The SEC might not be as strong as it once was, but it’s a gauntlet none the less. Former LSU head coach Les Miles wasn’t fired because he couldn’t win. No, he was let go because he couldn’t make it through the entirety of the SEC schedule without someone tripping his team up right before the finish line. More often than not, that was Alabama, but even Arkansas can be intimidating during the heart of the conference schedule.
Like Miles’ teams before him, Oregon will win a few big games early. The Tigers will be rewarded with a top 25 ranking. But I’m still not a believer in the staying power of LSU or Orgeron. Until he wins consistently I’m learning towards the under. ESPN FPI tabs the Tigers as a borderline 8-4 or 9-3 team. That’s a bit too rich for my liking. I see one, maybe two wins in the month of November. That’s going to hurt the bottom line and leave them unranked by the end of the season.
Prediction: 7-5
Next: Ranking the top 50 CFB players in 2017
Consider me a pessimist when it comes to Orgeron’s hiring at LSU. Midway through the Texas A&M game last season the word was out that the Tigers had hired Tom Herman. That fell through and LSU was left with Orgeron. He seems like a great guy, and a decent coordinator, but not the caliber of coach you’d expect to be in charge of a blue-blood program like LSU.