Stats of note while we wait for Saturday

Stats of note while we wait for Saturday

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Stats of note while we wait for Saturday
BATON ROUGE, LA – SEPTEMBER 12: Landen Clark #11 of the LSU Tigers scores past Lane Condry #92 of the Louisiana Tech Bulldogs during the second half on September 12, 2026, at Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. (Photo by Derick Hingle/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images) | Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

If you’ve paid attention to college football the last two weeks, you’re aware LSU has been crowned a juggernaut that’s going to blast through everything in its path and send those teams straight to hell. Or so the narrative goes.

This narrative is primarily based on the Tigers wrecking a Clemson team filled with players who should be competing for spots at Furman or Florida State. Hey-ooohhhhhhh.

LSU deserves credit for said wrecking (51-10 is sick stuff), but this year’s Clemson team is well behind last year’s 7-6 team that lost to a coachless Penn State in the Bad Boy Mowers Pinstripe Bowl.

I should also note LSU beat Louisiana Tech last week, 45-14, after leading 10-7 at halftime. Again, credit to them for waking up and destroying a team they should destroy, but I do want to thank them for not covering, though sweating out +35.5 was an unpleasant way to spend part of Saturday night.

Given LSU’s juggernaut status, let’s see if the offensive numbers back that up. And we’re only going to look at offensive stats because the LSU defense appears to be big, fast, and strong like every LSU defense* before them.

*Except that one LSU defense when Ole Miss beat them 55-49 in 2023. Lmao. That group was terrible.

However, I would like to point out Clemson’s offensive stats from their 22-7 win over Georgia Southern:

It’s going great for Dabo and friends.

Anyhow, with the help of stats from TeamRankings and Game on Paper, let’s take a look at what the LSU offense is doing in terms of:

  • Explosiveness
  • Efficiency
  • Turnovers

These are three of the five factors that usually determine who wins games, which we’ve discussed in great detail many times. Since we’re two weeks into the season, the total possessions sample size is very small, so a full five factors breakdown, which would include finishing drives and field position, doesn’t seem super informative, but we’ll cover some of that below.

Explosiveness

Two ways to measure this are yards per play and points per play. The more explosive plays on offense you have, the easier it is to score.

Yards per play:

  • LSU offense – 32nd

For comparison, I’ll throw in the Ole Miss offense’s numbers to give you a better idea of how LSU’s is performing. In this category, Ole Miss is 22nd.

Points per play:

  • LSU offense – 30th
  • Ole Miss offense – 16th

LSU’s numbers are fine, but nothing scary. Digging in a little deeper, LSU is 42nd in rushing yards/attempt (Ole Miss is 51st), and a huge chunk of that is due to quarterback Sam Leavitt making plays either on designed runs or when a pass play breaks down. The point being, they are not grinding teams up in the run game.

Efficiency

The best ways to measure this are success rate (the rate at which offenses gain 50 percent of yards needed on 1st down, 75 percent on second down, and 100 percent on 3rd/4th down) and 3rd/4th down conversions.

Success rate:

  • LSU offense – 50th (55th pass, 52nd rush)
  • Ole Miss offense – 44th (66th pass, 42nd rush)

3rd/4th down success rate:

  • LSU offense – 26th
  • Ole Miss offense – 78th

Basically, LSU is kind of blah in their success rate in early downs, but they make up for it on 3rd and 4th downs. So one of the key factors for Saturday will be can the Ole Miss defense make them pay for not being as successful in early downs.

Turnovers

LSU has five turnovers in two games (Ole Miss has three). More importantly, four of those turnovers have come via Leavitt interceptions.

He’s averaging an interception every 16.5 passes, which is, uh, not great, Bob. That is of note because, if the Ole Miss defense limits LSU’s moderately successful run game, he’ll have to throw more than Lane Kiffin and Charlie Weis Jr. want him to.

Miscellaneous

  • LSU has scored on 75 percent of their red zone trips (Ole Miss – 100 percent)
  • LSU is 49th in average starting field position (Ole Miss is 45th)
  • LSU is 73rd in sack percentage allowed (Ole Miss is 17th)
  • Against Louisiana Tech, LSU gave up 5 sacks and 11 tackles for loss
  • Outside of running back Dilin Jones’ 46-yard run against Louisiana Tech, he’s averaging 3.3 yards/carry on all other carries, which also speaks to Leavitt being called upon to generate rushing yards

The point of everything above is to show that the LSU offense is not a freight train from hell. They’ve put up good numbers against two bad teams, but nothing that screams how can Ole Miss solve an impossible equation.

Now, if the Ole Miss defense stinks (which it could!), these numbers are good enough for LSU to win. Unless LSU’s defense is a beneficiary of two outclassed offenses and a shoot-out situation develops.

I, for one, believe there’s too much talent on the Ole Miss defense to repeat a Louisville performance. When the season ends, that feels like it will be an outlier.

But for Saturday, they’re not being tasked with slowing down the 1999 Rams or a similar insanity.

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