.. October 3, 1998, the wheels fell off the Gerry Dinardo regime. LSU lost a great game to Georgia, 28-27, and Dinardo never recovered. Georgia was led by Champ Bailey and especially QB Qunicy Carter, who had a heisman-worthy day, going 27-34 for 318 yards, 2 TDs, 0 INTs, plus 41 yards rushing. The Tigers trailed 28-21 going in to the 4th quarter and twice drove deep into UGA territory, including 1st and goal at the 5, but had to settle for FGs both times.

Going in to the Georgia game, LSU was at a high-water mark for the 1990s. The Tigers were 3-0 and ranked #6 in the country, in good position for a run at the national title. Over 3 years into his tenure as coach, Gerry Dinardo boasted an excellent 29-9-1 record, including 3 straight bowl wins.

But from October 3, 1998 until November 1999, when he was fired, Dinardo's record would be a dreadful 2-15. The Tigers would go 1-7 the rest of 1998, and start 2-8 in 1999, A stark contrast to his earlier success.

The game was also a sort of turning point for Georgia coach Jim Donnan as well. Donnan had taken over at Georgia in 1996, and after getting off to a dreadful start that year with a 5-6 record, led them to a 10-2 mark in 1997, including wins over arch-rival Florida and in-state rival Georgia Tech and an Outback Bowl win.

But, in 1998 after beating LSU to go to 4-0 and vaulting in to the top 10, Georgia would lose the very next week to eventual national champion Tennessee, 37-20, and would limp to a 5-3 finish, including losses to both Florida and Georgia Tech.

After the Tennessee loss, Georgia would never again be in the top 10 under Donnan, and two years later, after UGA posted disappointing 8-4 records which included 3 straight years of losing to both Florida and GT, Donnan was fired, paving the way for the hiring of Mark Richt. So the 1998 LSU win was Donnan's high water-mark as well.

To my way of thinking, the current, unprecedented success of the LSU program was born 10 years ago today. The loss to Georgia led to the collapse of the Dinardo regime, and the hiring of Nick Saban, and well you know the rest ...

Anyway, that's today's Tigers history lesson.

Great post stephenj. Quality post. :thumb:

All against Lou Tepper's 'vaunted' defense. You know, the one that takes kids on a 4 year scholarship 5 years to learn. :dis: Lou Tepper sucks.

Speaking of Tepper..........I read Scott Rabalais' history of the last 15 years of LSU football and wasn't pleased to see a full page photo of Tepper. Too bad the photo wasn't of him instructing the defensive backs not to look back for the ball.

Chris

you mean that "soft zone" defense we played all game long, giving the opposing QB (no matter how chitty) all freaking day to just sit back, make a sandwich, then pick apart?

I haven't heard the phrase "drop linebacker" since Tepper left. I think that's a good thing.

As for waking at 4:30 ... i didn't do it intentionally but couldn't fall back asleep and so ... oh what the hey!

And i guess the one good thing about the Dinardo era was the 3-0 bowl mark. That started a trend of winning bowl games that has continued to this day. Before 1995, LSU had a bowl record of 11-16-1. Since then, we've gone 9-2 in bowl games. LSU has won almost half the bowl games it has ever won in the past 13 years.

I was driving down to Baton Rouge from Dallas that day (because it was the beginning of my fall break from school.) I listened to the game on the radio, and had to pull my Jeep over in Erwinville, to recover from the despair after the 2 point conversion failed.