It seems that — finally — the LSU Tigers have backed off their plan to add former NFL players to their roster. It had gotten to the point that coach Lane Kiffin and school officials were targeted by the Southeastern Conference, and the SEC even threatened to expel the Tigers from the conference. That potential expulsion still faces a Thursday vote, but it seems there's no real desire on anyone's side to see LSU and the SEC part ways.
Even LSU President Wade Rousse has noted the issue of professionals coming back to play in college "moot." That said, LSU's rivals are still enjoying watching the Tigers being pilloried in the press. On the Texas A&M radio show "The Aggie Football Hour," head coach Mike Elko was quick to reassure his fanbase that their hated Tigers weren't going anywhere. "LSU will be in the SEC," he said, as reported by TexAgs.
"LSU will be fired up when we go to Baton Rouge in a couple of weeks. All of those things are going to happen." Now that that was out of the way, though, Elko couldn't resist getting a sly dig in on LSU and their battle with the SEC. As he put it, the SEC is something like an authority figure having to discipline an unruly child.
"This is just a little bit of...parenting...going on right now," he said. That description surely got under the skin of some LSU fans, but it's not far off of reality. In defiance of conference rules, LSU and Kiffin tried to add two professional football players, Dae'Quan Wright and Zxavian Harris, to the Tigers, citing recent conflicting court rulings about an extra year of eligibility for players in the 2022 recruiting class.
The conference then had to lay down the law, threatening expulsion for the Tigers after widespread outrage among the league's other schools. It didn't help, of course, that Kiffin couldn't resist referencing the ongoing saga during a halftime interview on Saturday. "Imagine if we had NFL players," he said of his team's 31-3 lead midway through the game.
It sounds like the SEC asked LSU to imagine a future without their traditional rivalries and LSU said "no thanks."
Extract — continue reading at the source.
