SportsRatings 2014 College Football Pre-season Top 128
| LSU Tigers (SEC #6; West #4) |
 #13 |
2013 Results |
AP #14 USA #14 | Strength:#16 Success:#13 Overall:#15 |
| Record: 10-3 | Bowl: beat Iowa 21-14 (Outback) |
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| 2014 Outlook |
Picks: AP #13 | USA #13 | Lindy's #11 | Athlon #19 | Steele #14 | ||
| Record: 8-4 | Bowl odds: 97% Playoff odds: 1% | ||
LSU has some big losses on offense and defense, but they have some of the country's top recruits ready to plug the holes.
| Offense 6 ret. starters |
2013 Scoring Offense: #24 (raw) #16 (adjusted for opposition) |
| 2014 Projected Scoring Offense: #52 (adjusted) |
After a year of run/pass balance, LSU may depend heavily on a freshman phenom running back to drive their offense.
| Passing Game |
2013 Passing Rank: #47 (raw) #41 (adjusted) | 2013 Sacks Allowed (adj.): #77 |
| 2014 Projected Passing Rank: #110 (adjusted) |
2014 Sacks Allowed (proj.): #57 |
Zach Mettenberger (3,082 yards, 22 TDs, 8 int) finally did live up to the hype in his 2nd year as starting quarterback, but now he leaves a void that LSU will try to fill with either true freshman Brandon Harris or Anthony Jennings (181 yards, 1 TD, 1 int) who started late last year with Mettenberger hurt; Les Miles said that both will play in the opener. Just as big of a problem will be replacing top receivers Jarvis Landry (1,193 yards, 10 TDs) and Odell Beckham (1,152 yards, 8 TDs), who combined for over 70% of the team's receiving yards; sophomore Travin Dural (7 catches, 145 yards) is the leading returnee. The offensive line should improve from last year's poor protection (25 sacks in 326 attempts) but we see the team going back to leaning on the run again.
| Rushing | 2013 Rushing Rank: #30 (raw) #28 (adjusted) | 2014 Projected Rushing Rank: #36 (adj.) |
Jeremy Hill (1,401 yards, 16 TDs) is gone. Two of the next three rushers return, led by Terrence Magee (626 yards), but all the hype is going to freshman Leonard Fournette, the consensus top running back recruit in the country. The offensive line returns four starters—Elliot Porter, La'el Collins, Vadal Alexander, and Jerald Hawkins—and should therefore be stronger, but without a decent passing game opponents may stack against the run. If Fournette proves as good as advertised the RB stable could increase production over last year, but we don't count on an Adrian Peterson freshman season from him.
| 2013 Adjusted Stats: | Rush Defense: #17 Pass Defense per-game: #27 Per-attempt: #18 | ||
| Defense 7 ret. starters |
'13 Scoring Defense: #23 (raw) #26 (adjusted) | '13 sacks: #36 | '13 picks: #69 |
| '14 Projected Scoring Defense: #19 (adjusted) |
'14 sacks: #24 | '14 picks: #38 | |
LSU returns two starters to the front four, but the defensive line had some bad luck as reserve Jordan Allen transferred to Arizona; another reserve, Trey Lealaimatafao punched some glass in the weight room and may be out the year. At linebacker top tackler Lamin Barrow is gone but DJ Welter and Kwon Alexander return. The secondary looks stronger and LSU should exceed last year's 11 picks easily; Jalen Mills is back and seems to have avoided game suspension for allegedly punching a woman, with "extra conditioning" as his punishment. The defense appears to be a bit better than last year.
Special Teams/Situations
- Kicking Game: Both kicker Colby Delahoussaye (13 of 14 FG) and punter Jamie Keehn (41.0 average) are back.
- Return Game: Last year's #2 receiver Odell Beckham will also be missed as a return man, where he averaged 26.4 yards per kickoff and 8.9 on punts.
- Turnovers projection: LSU can probably count on a little better luck with fumble recoveries but the QB interception totals might be in for a big jump from Metterberger's 8. The defense should increase their total, too, and their turnover composite is mostly unchanged from last year.
- Injury correction: LSU had pretty much an average amount of injuries last year on both offense and defense.
Coaching/Recruiting 2014 Recruiting Rank: #4 2013 Recruiting Rank: #8
When you recruit like Les Miles, you can patch over many of your team's shortcomings with true freshmen. Case in point: LSU needs a running back? How about 5-star Leonard Fournette, whom Miles compared to Michael Jordan. LSU needs to replace star receivers? How about 5-star Malachi Dupre, who, like Fournette, is from New Orleans. Need a quarterback? Brandon Harris comes in from Bossier City, LA. For the defense, there are 5-stars Clifton Jarrett from Illinois and Jamal Adams from Carrollton, TX. As long as he recruits like this, no matter what his critics say Les Miles is going to win a lot of football games.
2013 Recap
LSU started 4-0, including a win over Auburn which seemed too tough at the time (35-21) but in retrospect was their biggest win of the year. Immediately after, though, they lost to Georgia 44-41, and later fell to Ole Miss (27-24) and Alabama (38-17). They throttled Texas A&M 34-10 and to finish 9-3, then won an uninspired victory over Iowa, 21-14, in the Outback Bowl.
Last year's prediction: We ranked LSU #18, which if you look at our Strength ranking (#16) and poll finish (#14) was just about right. But with their schedule in the SEC that translated to an expected 7-5 record, which was too harsh. We got every game right except TCU and Texas A&M, though, giving them a 49% chance to beat the Horned Frogs.
2014 Outlook
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LSU 2014 schedule & forecast |
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| 8/30 | Sat | vs. | Wisconsin | 64% | W | |||
| 9/6 | Sat | vs. | Sam Houston St. | 98% | W | |||
| 9/13 | Sat | vs. | UL-Monroe | 99% | W | |||
| 9/20 | Sat | vs. | *Mississippi State | 67% | W | |||
| 9/27 | Sat | vs. | New Mexico State | 99% | W | |||
| 10/4 | Sat | @ | *Auburn | 29% | L | |||
| 10/11 | Sat | @ | *Florida | 49% | L | |||
| 10/18 | Sat | vs. | *Kentucky | 90% | W | |||
| 10/25 | Sat | vs. | *Mississippi | 57% | W | |||
| 11/8 | Sat | vs. | *Alabama | 30% | L | |||
| 11/15 | Sat | @ | *Arkansas | 73% | W | |||
| 11/27 | Thu | @ | *Texas A&M | 53% | W | |||
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Straight up: 9-3 Cume: 8-4 Bowl eligible: 97%
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A great game kicks off LSU's season as they take on Wisconsin in Houston. We call it a practical home game for the Tigers and favor them to win.
The next two are jokes against Sam Houston State and UL-Monroe, with New Mexico State thrown in later for a real laugher. In between the SEC season begins against Mississippi State, which is another challenge on the level of the Badgers. At this point note that LSU has not played a road game.
That changes when they head to Auburn and it's one reason we're pretty sure they'll take their first loss there. The go to Florida a week later and they'll need to have recovered fully if they want to win this tossup game.
Then it's back home for Kentucky (win), Mississippi (tough, but probable win), and Alabama (still looks like a loss). The end on the road at Arkansas and Texas A&M, with the latter almost being another pick'em.
Adding up the picks that's 8 to 10 wins depending on Florida and Texas A&M, with the cumulative odds adding up to an 8-4 season. LSU always has a chance to make some noise in the national championship department, and we give them around a 1% chance to make the College Football Playoff. There are too many higher-ranked teams in their way, so unless their freshman come through for them big time they're probably not in it.
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