On3 Roundtable: LSU given floor of 10-win season

LSU made strides under first-year head coach Brian Kelly in 2022. Entering year two, the expectations are through the roof.

Bengal Tiger’s Shea Dixon joined JD PicKell at the On3 Roundtable to reveal where LSU’s win-loss record should stand at the end of the 2023 regular season to be considered a successful campaign.

“I’ll speak to the LSU fans. I love the Kim Mulkey approach here. What I mean by that is in year one when she got here, [LSU Women’s Basketball team] had won nine games a year prior,” Dixon told PicKell. “They asked her what the goal is for a national championship coach like her and she said, ‘If we won nine games a year ago, the goal is to win 10.’ And I took that same approach with Brian Kelly a year ago.

“Improvement is marked by wins and losses, right? So to be improved, you need to win at least one more game. After back-to-back 500 regular seasons for LSU, Brian Kelly comes in and they win nine regular season games, they get to double-digit wins with a bowl win. I think this time around the floor has to be 10 wins.”

If LSU finds itself with a 10-win regular season, it almost ensures that either the Tigers would be back in the SEC Championship, they would certainly be in a New Year’s Six bowl game, or even find themselves ranked in the top four when the final College Football Playoff rankings roll around.

Leading that charge is quarterback Jayden Daniels, who finished his first season with the Tigers having thrown for 2,913 yards, 17 touchdowns and three interceptions on a 68.6% completion percentage. He also contributed 885 rushing yards and 11 more touchdowns on the ground — and is only expected to build on that during the 2023 season.

His dynamic play has put him in the preseason conversation as a Heisman Trophy hopeful heading into the season. Daniels has previously spoken on the potential of him winning college football’s top individual prize, saying that he “would be lying if I said it wasn’t on my mind,” but he certainly won’t be able to accomplish that feat without oodles of talent surrounding him — which he has. Instead, Daniels is focused on helping put his team in a position to win a national championship.

LSU is set to kick off its 2023 season against the Florida State Seminoles in Orlando on Sept. 3. FSU took home last year’s victory in a 24-23 thriller, and the Tigers will look to avenge that loss before ending the two-year series.