Lane Kiffin left Ole Miss for LSU in the middle of a College Football Playoff run, and he did not leave alone. this is a full system transplant — a new coach, a portal quarterback, two Ole Miss defensive starters following him to Baton Rouge, and a roster with 59 new scholarship players. LSU is not rebuilding. it is being replaced, piece by piece, with a version of the team that just finished second in the country in total offense somewhere else. The scout
Everything starts with Sam Leavitt, the No. 1 quarterback in this year's transfer portal. at Arizona State in 2024, he threw for 2,885 yards with 24 touchdowns against only six interceptions, ran for 443 more yards and five scores, and took the Sun Devils to an 11-3 finish and a Playoff berth. across his full college career, he is 16-4 as a starter with 34 touchdowns and just nine interceptions — an elite ratio at any level. the only real question is health: a November foot surgery limited him to seven games in 2025, and he is expected to be fully cleared by August. everything LSU wants to be in 2026 depends on that foot.
Protecting him is Jordan Seaton, the top left tackle in this year's portal class, arriving from Colorado. last season, LSU's offense averaged just 333.5 yards and 22.8 points per game behind a line that could not protect Garrett Nussmeier consistently. Kiffin's Ole Miss offense, by comparison, ranked No. 2 nationally at 490 yards and 37 points per game last season. Seaton is the single biggest reason to believe that gap can close fast. The receiving corps is almost entirely new, led by Florida transfer Eugene Wilson III, but the two names Kiffin actually needed to keep were already on the roster. running backs Harlem Berry and Caden Durham both had a clear path to leave for a fresh start elsewhere, and persuading both to stay in Baton Rouge is being treated as one of the biggest wins of the offseason — a backfield that already knows the building, now running behind an entirely rebuilt offensive line. tight end Trey'Dez Green is the offense's built-in mismatch piece, coming off a 33-catch, 433-yard, seven-touchdown season and versatile enough to line up anywhere Kiffin wants him.