'I've never seen it like this': Welcome to the Lane Kiffin Show

BATON ROUGE, La. -- Thousands of LSU fans, wet from the rain and the stifling humidity of early September in Louisiana, crowded shoulder-to-shoulder along North Stadium Drive hours before the Tigers kicked off against Clemson, waiting to see this team -- and more so, its new head coach -- march from Victory Hill to the locker room. Clydesdales clopped their way past the gawking masses before LSU filed onto the street. Then came Kiffin, flanked by comedian Theo Von, former LSU gymnast Livvy Dunne and model Brooks Naler. More than 900 credentials for media and former players and, yes, celebrities, were issued by LSU for this game, a record for the school. More than half of NFL teams had a scout in attendance. Sorority girls wore pins that said "Lane Train" and fraternity brothers wore shirts that read "Kiffin-Boosie 2028," a nod to one of Baton Rouge's beloved native sons and it's $91-million import, now perhaps even more beloved. Around here, they're fond of saying there's nothing in sports like a night game in Death Valley, but even by LSU standards, this one was different. "I've never seen it like this," said Alex Voorhies, who's been coming to LSU games for more than 40 years, and said he's been on hand for more than 200 Tiger Walks. "You can feel the electricity in the air. It's either that or the humidity." Not long after Kiffin reached the locker room with his entourage of celebrities, the skies opened. The video boards announced a lightning delay, but the student section remained unflustered. Hundreds of LSU students, nearly three hours before the game would eventually kick off, removed their shirts and spun them in the air, singing along to Prince's "Purple Rain." The skies cleared at last, just shy of 7 p.m. local time, and the sidelines soon filled with an ocean of recruits and their families, former LSU players from Leonard Fournette to JaMarcus Russell, and, yes, celebrities. A security detail whisked Von past screaming fans, while Dunne posed for dozens of pictures. In their hands, they both held credentials that read: "Guest of Lane Kiffin." For all the star power, the energy reached its apex at the culmination of the player introductions on the massive video board in the south end zone when the words echoed through the valley: "Head coach Lane Kiffin." There was a game to be played, but on a wet Saturday night at LSU, this was the Lane Kiffin Show. NEARLY FIVE HOURS before the game kicked off, Alex Oblance stood in front of Mike the Tiger's habitat just outside the stadium, drinking a beer and wearing a "Play Neck" hat. On his shirt was a photo of Kiffin, giving the middle finger, with a caption that read, "Spot the ball." Kiffin has invited little other than controversy over the past 10 months, from an infamously awkward exit from Ole Miss to a handful of scandalous comments to media about his previous employer, to the final two weeks leading up to kickoff in which he publicly fought to add a pair of players who'd previously signed NFL contracts but had been granted eligibility by a local judge. The SEC was angry. Governors and lawmakers in other states were angry. Dabo Swinney was angry. The world was angry -- but for Kiffin, that's nothing new. LSU knew what it was getting when they gave Kiffin a seven-year, $91 million contract to take over a wounded program, and Tigers fans aren't shying away from his edgier side. Indeed, Kiffin has installed a sign in the LSU locker room that reads, "If you want to win at the highest level, you have to become a villain in someone's ele's story." The label feels just right, Oblance said. In the parlance of Oblance's preferred theme song, they done let the wild beast in, and this is their season. "You can take it and wear it on your chest," he said. "If you're not hated, you're not doing anything right." VOORHIES AND HIS brother, Ted, said Kiffin's arrival felt like the start of something big, a throwback to the era when Nick Saban prowled these sidelines and brought LSU the 2003 national championship before absconding to the NFL. The Tigers have won two more championships since then, but in Baton Rouge, Saban's departure always felt like an opportunity missed, a time when LSU could've become the preeminent program in the sport and, instead, watched rival Alabama claim that mantle. Kiffin had sat next to Saban on the set of "College GameDay" a few hours earlier, admitting that he'd been but a child during his time working for Saban at Alabama, but the older he's gotten, he said, the more he's become like his old boss. That's exactly what LSU fans want to hear. This is the dawn of a new era, yes, but it's, perhaps, a second chance at the dynasty that might have been. "This was always the place," Ted Voorhies said. "What if Saban had stayed? And now I think the thing is, is Lane that guy? Is he going to be our Saban, be what should have been?" Or, perhaps, Kiffin's return is a bridge back to a more recent era, when Ed Orgeron led LSU to the 2019 national championship. Oregeron was unceremoniously fired in 2021, banished from his dream job less than two years after leading LSU to the promised land. Since then, Orgeron had kept a low profile, keeping his distance from the program he loved during Brian Kelly's rocky tenure in Baton Rouge. But Orgeron and Kiffin had history dating back to their time together at USC, and so when Kiffin got the job, the wall built between LSU and Orgeron came down. Orgeron joined Kiffin's staff as a special assistant, and his presence back at LSU has felt like an exorcising of demons. And so speckled amid the jerseys featuring "Burreaux" and "Jefferson" and "Daniels" with the "5" crossed, there were T-shirts honoring Orgeron, including one sweat-soaked fan with Kiffin and Orgeron posing like the characters in the movie "Step Brothers." "Did we just become best friends?" it asked on the back. "Yup." "Want to go win a national championship?" "Yup." KIFFIN BROUGHT WITH him to LSU the basketball goal he'd have dragged to the sideline for each Ole Miss game, allowing players to celebrate with dunks after big plays. Saturday, a Clemson tiger paw was plastered on the backboard. It got a lot of use. Jordan Ross's pick-six in the first half resulted in a missed dunk that may have been the one flaw in LSU's dream performance. Quarterback Sam Leavitt had a pair of touchdown runs in the first half, and by the break, LSU led 31-3. As he wrapped a halftime interview with ESPN's Holly Rowe in which he complained about an early INT that led to Clemson's lone points, Kiffin turned back and underscored his hold on the college football world. "Imagine," he said, "if we'd used pro players." By the time Winston Watkins Jr. strolled into the end zone on a wide-open 32-yard touchdown reception with 8:21 left in the third quarter, just a fraction of the student section that had endured torrential rains remained to celebrate. At the outset of the fourth quarter, only the die hards remained, the ones who wanted to say they stayed through all of this, every moment of Kiffin's dominant debut. When it was over, Kiffin had succeeded in delivering LSU fans everything his hire promised, but also the one thing he seemed entirely incapable of doing throughout the past 10 months. He'd made it boring: LSU 51, Clemson 10. "Our mock team scored more points against us than them."