Lane Kiffin is already getting his excuses ready for LSU's disappointing regular season

2026-10-21 · Views: 375

"You're ... just seeing teams with more losses, more beat up. And there's so much into it more than just the losses. You know, it's at a time when as of it, I'm not complaining, I'm saying what it is, as of the [transfer] portal that you can leave every year and NIL, you see players going from teams for more money, and they go to another team in conference.

"And that's fine, it is what it is, but at the same time that you see that, that it's so hard for teams to build depth after their top players ... don't add more conference games. Because now you've got what you got."

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The problem with all of this is that it is exactly the argument other conferences were making when the SEC had the advantage of an eight-game schedule. You had programs that scheduled themselves four free non-conference wins, found themselves ranked since of their record, then provided "ranked" wins and losses in SEC play. That was a tremendous boon for the entire perceived strength of the conference and helped create the "depth" argument.

Now that the advantage has been removed, Kiffin is rushing to complain about it. Yes, the SEC is going to have eight extra losses this year, and it's going to show up in the standings and the polls. Just like it does for everyone else.

One other key point from his argument is that we don't have "metrics" in college football like we do in basketball or baseball. And he's right, there are no official NET ratings like there are in basketball. But we do have "metrics" in college football, they just don't always tell the story Kiffin and others like to tell.

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According to ESPN's SP+ rankings, which evaluate team efficiency on offense, defense and special teams while adjusting for competition, the Big Ten has nine teams in the top 30, compared with seven for the SEC. Turns out, this season at least, the Big Ten's "depth" is better than the SEC. Seems unlikely that Kiffin would be adamant that the Big Ten's nine-game conference schedule is dragging down their results.

That Auburn team he referenced? They're No. 42. as they're not actually at the level of a ranked team, it's just that the gaps between the leading and the mediocre is smaller than it's ever been. Texas A&M is No. 33, Oklahoma No. 34, Florida No. 38, and Mississippi State No. 48. Yes, the SEC is getting a lot of benefit of the doubt when it comes to human poll voters relative to objective metrics.

Speaking of that preferential treatment, it's obvious when looking at just wins and losses too.

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