Brian Kelly trolls Paul Finebaum after preseason takes fall flat

No. 9 LSU had one of the best weekends to start the season in all of college football by going on the road and winning at No. 4 Clemson. With that, Brian Kelly got to take a bit of a victory lap on Paul Finebaum while on his show on Monday.

Kelly made one of his regular appearances on ‘The Paul Finebaum Show’ this afternoon coming off the 17-10 win for the Tigers this weekend. In doing so, he got to take a little jab at the host after he had picked Clemson to beat LSU in the opener, and also in predicting for life to “become very miserable quickly for Brian Kelly”.

"You had a tough loss this weekend and you came on the show so I appreciate that."

– @LSUfootball @CoachBrianKelly joking around with me after the big win over Clemson. pic.twitter.com/BtOBa5D6g2

— Paul Finebaum (@finebaum) September 1, 2025

“You know me, Paul. I’ve been on this show whether I’ve won games or lost games. And, you know, you had a tough loss this weekend and you came on this show, so I appreciate that,” Kelly joked. “So, I think you and I both understand, in this business, you’ve got good days, you’ve got bad days and you just move on and keep doing your job, and that’s what we’ll do here. We’ll move on. We’ll keep doing our job. We’ve got a good football team but we’ve got to keep them focused on the next week.”

“A certain bespeckled commentator, a week ago, said you would be miserable today. It looks like I’m the one that’s miserable,” Finebaum conceded.

Again, it was a long weekend for Finebaum for his takes beyond just picking Clemson to beat LSU. He went with the Tigers while also having several takes, among others, on teams like No. 1 Texas and No. 8 Alabama that did not come true with losses for both the Longhorns in Columbus and the Crimson Tide in Tallahassee.

Going back to the Tigers, though, Kelly was proud of his team for winning their opener for the first time of his tenure and the program’s first time this decade. They took on the challenge that came with that game and left with one of the weekend’s biggest wins.

“I mean, you had two great teams, right. I mean, Clemson is an outstanding football team. Dabo has been doing this a long time and he’s had great success. He’ll have that team ready to play the rest of the ACC schedule. But, I think what’s most important is the composure and the resolve. You know, we were a little sloppy in the first half – you know, the turnovers. But, we maintained what I call the maturity, an emotional stability in the second half where we go out and do our job, play in and play out, and really took control of the football game in the second half,” said Kelly. “So, really pleased with the composure of this football team because, you know, when you put together a lot of transfers, bring them in, you know, your biggest concern is how are they all going to work together? I was confident they would and it showed itself.”