Scooter Hobbs column: Tigers can now move on after gutsy bowl showing

Published 9:41 am Monday, December 29, 2025

HOUSTON — The day LSU starts applauding mere effort and accepting moral victories is the day the Tigers need to just bite the bullet, pay off the applicable coaching buyouts and shut down the program.

Not to worry.

None of that happened Saturday in the Kinder’s Texas Bowl, even though keeping it close in a 38-35 loss to Houston was probably about as encouraging as the Tigers could have hoped for.

Bottom line?

“Our best wasn’t good enough,” said interim coach Frank Wilson, who’ll now join a new staff as part of the massive LSU-Ole Miss coaching exchange.

Consolation?

It wasn’t as nearly as bad as many had feared. Or as football logic would have predicted.

Yes, the Tigers who did show up showed up ready and willing to play — even if many were probably not quite ready. As Wilson said, they were “asked to do things that they had not done in an entire season.

“For that, I’m proud of their efforts.”

He should have been. But you don’t grade LSU on the curve, no matter the circumstances.

Any dissecting needs to be done as if this game was on the level.

Still, it’s OK to give LSU credit. Sorely depleted as the Tigers were, if nothing else it was more entertaining than most of this team’s efforts this season when more fully stocked. And it might have gotten really interesting had— What-if alert — the Tigers cashed in on as good of an opportunity as they’ll ever get to recover an onsides kick at the end.

But what do you expect when you send the JV squad to a bowl game?

Here’s a few nuggets for you: LSU started five freshmen and eight sophomores. Another 18 freshmen played in the game along with 10 more sophomores.

I’ll do the math for you — that’s 13 of 22 starters who were freshmen and sophomores. Of the 59 who eventually saw the field, 41 were in their first two years.

Houston had no opt-outs for the game, according to head coach Willie Fritz. Zero. Evidently the Cougars didn’t get the memo that it was a meaningless bowl.

Coach Lane Kiffin, the new LSU savior in waiting, prowled the sidelines for part of the first quarter and did a TV cameo in the second quarter before leaving NRG Stadium.

Early on, he must have wondered what the crisis was —why was LSU was so anxious to pay so extravagantly for his services?

LSU had been extracting offensive points from an eye dropper all season.

The LSU offense was fairly intact, although that meant basically the same offensive line that has been comically overmatched all season.

The Tigers solved that problem with a play they hadn’t run all year —Barion Brown’s 99-yard return of the opening kickoff for a 7-0 lead.

It was possibly a fluke — the first time since 1978 LSU had scored in any game’s opening kickoff — although UH went to awkward extremes to steer kicks away from Brown the rest of the night.

Yet, the first LSU play from scrimmage was something really different — a 36-yard run by Harlem Berry that set up a 14-0 lead just over four minutes in after just four LSU plays from scrimmage.

It was fool’s gold. The usual problems kept showing up. And on his third carry Berry lost a fumble and was sent to time out for the duration.

The Tigers still couldn’t run the ball, especially when a yard or two was crucial.

The line struggled as it has all along – it seemed like UH had more than the four sacks it was credited with — although the Tigers kept things close with some timely chunk plays.

If you’d known the Tigers would put up 35 points —10 more than they’d managed against an FBS opponent all season — you’d figure they’d be adding a (meaningless) bowl trophy to the case.

But the defense, which held this team somewhat together all season but was missing six starters was probably the biggest culprit in the loss.

“There’s a there’s a gap there from those guys who opted out, and those guys who are here,” Wilson said.

At least it was different.

The best thing about the game was that, after 13 mostly excruciating games and way too much drama off the field, this season is finally over.

Your move, Lane.

His job is to make sure the Tigers never get in this position again, that a night like Saturday doesn’t happen again.

Time to do his magic in the transfer portal.

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Scooter Hobbs covers LSU athletics for the American Press. Contact him at scooter.hobbs@americanpress.com