Over the course of the last few years some (not all) have often attributed LSU's success to the "talent gap" that we supposedly have over other teams. Les should be 13-1 because LSU has better top to bottom talent. I am not a star watcher or care about Rivals rankings. However lets assume for a moment we truly use that as a barometer. Fact is LSU doesn't have better talent, equal in most cases and arguably less in others. Florida and Bama for example. Teams like Ole Miss now, Auburn, A&M and others have recruited as strong and in the case of this year stronger according to ESPN or a few other services. My point. Every win in the SEC is not a given and when you play so many games against equal or better talented teams we will lose some from time to time. I am not rehashing the past years. But going forward based on today and last year the "talent" gap doesn't exist anymore in our key rivals such as A&M, Bama and others. LSU will be underdogs to Bama for the foreseeable future and probably to A&M as well. So lets keep it in perspective Les has to coach his arse off to have double digit wins because all of opponents are just as good, have just as good facilities and in some cases even better. That is a simple fact.
I'm not disagreeing with the gist of what you're saying but do you realize that six of 14 SEC teams had double digit wins? Of those, LSU had the least "double-digits" with 10. There were 24 teams with double-digit win seasons last year. I think 17 of those were 11 or more. Double-digit win seasons are great but let's keep them in perspective too.
I guess North Texas, Idaho and Townson replaced them. The SEC West had the biggest number of 10 win teams in any division btw. Well, tied with the SEC East. Makes even me scratch my head cause it stands to reason that a conference so tough shouldn't have so many 10 win teams. I mean 6 or 14 teams with 10+ wins? No other conferences' divisions had more than two teams with 10+ wins. Heck, I don't think ANY conference had more than two teams with 10+ wins much less SIX. Each division (West and East) with 3 teams having 10 wins. Hmmmm....surely speaks to what my point was, double-digit seasons are pretty common- surprisingly, even moreso in the SEC...go figure.
4 out of the top 8 recruiting classes in the nation were for SEC West schools. Not saying the lists are perfect, but we play in clearly the toughest division of the toughest conference in college football. With our east schedule always including Florida, I really don't believe another team has it as tough as we do. Rambling, but I agree with Texas Tigers.
Well we didn't have 90K attendance records in the 60's, 70's and 80's either. We're talking about today, not pre-cell phone days.
To compare LSUs 10 win seasons to those of the likes of Boise St. or even FSU, Clemson, and VTech is a cruel joke. Towson, N Texas, and Idaho were no worse than the non conference foes of Alabama and others that won 10 games or more. In fact, I'd love to see Alabama play Florida cross conference every year, and I'd love to see them play USCe or someone like that as another cross conference game during this stretch. Instead, the chips are falling in their favor at this time, with Tennessee (their permanent cross conference rival) being terrible the last few years, and them getting the likes of Kentucky and Missouri instead of USCe, UF, or Georgia. And LSU played an absolutely BRUTAL schedule in 2011, in and out of conference. I'm with those that see clearly that it doesn't matter who we play out of conference, our schedule is STILL going to be one of the toughest in the nation...every single year.
Here's an indicator. LSU had great talent in the late 90s. Dinardo was a top notch recruiter, best since Chollie Mac at LSU. But he wasn't a great coach. He was a good coach, but he failed in staff management. It killed him. Sure, he 'brought the magic back', but it was short lived. And that's the thing...continuity. Success breeds success. Saban had talent when he got here, and knew what to do with it. He was a ruthless staff manager, too. Miles inherited talent when he got here, and has kept it going with solid coaching and staff management. He might be a little slow to pull the trigger on staff changes, but he damn sure corrects mistakes, and he's about to do it again, FWIW. Hugh Freeze and Ole Miss. Let's see what happens here. He's got something going on at Ole Miss, but lets see what he does with it. He's got some serious players, but can he coach em up? Can he assemble a staff and manage it? We'll see. Lots of coaches get on a hot streak, but unless they know WTF they're doing, it fizzles out pretty quick. Miles has been solid and in fact elite for nearly a decade at LSU. The day he leaves will be a bad day in Tiger Nation.
Some of you guys let your hatred and agenda get in the way of clear thinking because your mind is soooooo cloudy. How many other schools had 90K crowds back then. How many programs would love to be join our position today? I just can't get over the fact that so many LSU fans choose to be so derisive instead of basking in the successes we've had.
