Coach O = DL and Walker = DC

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Coaching Picture Starting To Look Clearer: No official moves have been made, but the rumor mill is starting to get pretty loud about head football coach Les Miles and his plans to retool his staff after the Chick-Fil-A Bowl.

Co-defensive coordinator Bradley Dale Peveto is a finalist for the Northwestern State job, which the rumor mill says he's going to get sometime this week. The rumor mill also has defensive line coach Earl Lane heading back to Florida - he's supposedly got an offer from Howard Schnellenberger at Florida Atlantic as assistant head coach as well as defensive line coach. And the word is Doug Mallory is talking to Oklahoma State, whose defensive coordinator Tim Beckman just got named as the head man at Toledo. I have no idea on a timetable for Lane and Mallory to make those moves if in fact they're making them, but that's the story.

Meanwhile, Miles seems to have zeroed in on his top choice as LSU's new defensive coordinator, and it's UCLA's DeWayne Walker. The key thing with Walker has been his pursuit of a head coaching position, but with the San Diego State job going to Ball State's Brady Hoke, which broke yesterday, it looks like Walker is getting shut out of the jobs he was pursuing.

The problem Walker had this year is he was the defensive coordinator on a bad UCLA team. The Bruins were just plain horrible on offense, and because of that their defensive numbers suffered. Prior to this year, though, Walker had been putting together a reputation for UCLA's defense as the best unit on the West Coast not named USC. Walker is a no-nonsense, hard-edged guy as a defensive coordinator, perhaps even harder-edged than Bo Pelini was, and he demands accountability and performance from his people. That would make him a terrific fit for LSU's defense, which was rudderless this year and definitely did not play as a team. A strong leader like Walker, who also happens to be well-regarded as an X's and O's man, who's known for aggressive, hard-hitting defenses and who has worked with some true masters of the game in Joe Gibbs, Bill Belichick, LaVell Edwards and Pete Carroll during his time as a coach, is a sensational fit.

Saturday night, though, the plot seemed to thicken a little. Contrary to previous reports, the story is now that Ed Orgeron is very much in the mix for LSU's coaching staff. Miles and Orgeron reportedly had a pow-wow in one of the suites at the Superdome during the 5A championship game Saturday night, and the word is things went well. Orgeron now seems to be in as the LSU defensive line coach for next year.

Walker and Orgeron are a nice fit, as they're both of the hard-arse school and together they would seem to promote a much tougher attitude on the LSU defense. They also both served under Carroll at USC in 2002, which was the year USC clobbered Iowa in the Orange Bowl and set the table for their AP national championship run the next season.

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