Mailbag Podcast: What did LSU change during its bye week?

In the latest edition of the Bengal Tiger podcast, Brune and Shea dive into the mailbag from the site’s subscribers to answer everything about this LSU football team and what’s ahead with South Carolina on Saturday. Who’s healthy? What do we expect? And much more on this episode!

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On the Pod: Number one storyline after the bye week against S. Carolina?

Shea Dixon: “Okay, you think about it and I’ll say mine. I want to see if Michael Van Buren is going to be involved. He’s LSU’s backup quarterback, but he’s mobile, right? He’s dual threat. And we saw him start at Mississippi State a year ago as a true freshman. Didn’t have a great record. They sucked.

But even today, Brian Kelly said, “Hey, look, he’s taken steps forward from where he was then to where he was in fall camp to where he is now.”

I’m not saying bench Nussmeier or anything like that. I want Nussmeier to be the starter. I want him to be healthy. I want to see it. But I do think you have someone that can bring an extra element to the field that, in my opinion, doesn’t hurt to test out.

And from feeling around, I get the sense that they’re more open to that now than they may have been the first month of the season. So, I don’t know if that begins this weekend, but I do want to see if Michael Van Buren starts to get some reps.

Because even—this will predate you, Matty B—but the old heads would know back when LSU won a natty, it wasn’t a two-quarterback system when they had Flynn and Perrilloux, but Perrilloux would come in and just run some plays that were dual-threat stuff. And it really just kind of shook things up. I’m just interested to see if they’ll do a little bit of that. So that’ll be mine.”

Matthew Brune: But my number one storyline—I’ll stick with the run game. Every… I watched Texas lose to Florida, and the run game disparity between those two teams was just jarring.

Like, Jadan Baugh for Florida was able to—he didn’t light them up—but it was four yards a carry on like 20-something attempts. And he ran for 100 yards. And you’re like, yeah, that’s what you kind of have to do in the SEC against these good defenses. You have to stick with it, and you have to figure it out, and you have to have a back that can make some plays.

And I thought Baugh—I’m just so high on Jadan Baugh in terms of what he can do—and that’s what I hope Caden Durham, at full strength, can kind of give them. I’m not even sure if he’s at full full strength, but can give them a bit of this week.

So hopefully the run game gets going. Hopefully they figure out the offensive line, the blocking, the schemes. All of that stuff, to me, against South Carolina is going to be imperative.

Because I don’t want—while South Carolina’s defense is not what it was last year—you still have Dylan Stewart on that team, you still have enough playmakers that can hurt you if you just drop back and pass 45 times. Like, I think there desperately needs to be some balance here.”