re: Quick Breakdown of Losses Under Miles

I'm not arguing that Miles has been great in his tenure. I'm simply trying to understand the purpose of the..you know what, forget it... It's a great thread and a great point. I love everyone.

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Texas and USC began the season ranked ahead of us and I don't think we would have been able to jump them

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I disagree. While the SEC did not have the irrefutable benefit of the doubt that it does now, it still commanded a great deal of respect. But there were three other factors that I think would have almost certainly tipped LSU ahead of Texas:

1) Katrina sympathy. Going undefeated in the wake of that calamity would have made it hard for anyone to vote us out of the top 2,

2) 2003 split championship -- this season was just 1 year removed from the LSU/SC split title controversy, and that would have been a VERY juicy storyline for a National Championship Game matchup, and

3) Auburn '04 -- in 2005, only one AQ conference team in the history of the BCS had ever been left out of the National Championship Game, and it was from the SEC. The SEC was also the only conference that had won two Championships in the BCS era (Tenn '98 and LSU '03; ACC, Big XII, Big East, Big 10 and Pac 10 had 1 each). Screwing our undefeated champion out of the game two years in a row would have been very hard to justify.

With all that riding in our favor, I think an undefeated LSU team absolutely gets into the National Championship Game against SC.

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And although the regular season ended in the SECCG, we got skulldrug by GA, and there were already a handful of "Miles Moments" to chew on heading into the bowl game where we took it out on the Irish.

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Actually, that was the year we took it out on the 'Canes. We took out the '06 Auburn game frustrations on the Irish the next year in the Sugar Bowl.

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The part of you, that last remaing doubt deep down in the pit of your stomach,that still fears that Les is just an average football mind who has succeeded wildy beyond his skill set, using a combination of good recruiting, good assistants (mostly),and sold-his-soul-to-the-devil luck, that part of you was conceived on that day.

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Sorry, but that "part" of me was prohibited from ever existing in Tempe, Arizona, two weeks earlier. I was there and watched one of the most exciting (though not most well-executed) football games I've ever seen, and watched an incredibly gutsy LSU team scratch out a victory against incredible odds (and a fairly decent Arizona State team). That team had all the excuses it needed to just run out of steam, but they refused to quit. That's why I laugh so hard at the absolute morons who complain about the "letdown" against Tennessee two weeks later. Anyone who had been there and seen those guys fighting in the desert would know that they gave every ounce of sweat, fight, determination and exertion humanly possible (and maybe then some) before succumbing to the complete exhaustion of the nightmare in which they'd been living for 3+ weeks.

Now, 7 years later, there's no doubt. It takes an astounding amount of stupidity to believe that anyone short of an excellent coach could achieve the things Miles has achieved here. Either stupidity, or just a pathetic emotional attachment to hating Miles for some pathetic irrational reason. Anyone with a lick of sense can see that his record irrefutably places him among the best coaches in the game at the moment, and he is knocking on the door of earning a place among some of the best of all time. He's obviously not there yet, but he is definitely knocking on the door.

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1) Katrina sympathy. Going undefeated in the wake of that calamity would have made it hard for anyone to vote us out of the top 2,

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I don't remember any of that coming from anywhere, really.

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2) 2003 split championship -- this season was just 1 year removed from the LSU/SC split title controversy, and that would have been a VERY juicy storyline for a National Championship Game matchup, and

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No. UT is a Tier 1 Media Darling.

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With all that riding in our favor, I think an undefeated LSU team absolutely gets into the National Championship Game against SC.

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Nope. Have to disagree.

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It takes an astounding amount of stupidity to believe that anyone short of an excellent coach could achieve the things Miles has achieved here.

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Amen!!

Way to many years of elite play since 05 and LSU 1st this and 1st that to not give LM his due unless one is just anti the guy.

Thank you NS for starting our current run of excellence and thank you LM for keeping it going 8 years after NS left us to move on to bigger things.

Losing back-to-back to Ole Mis can never happen

I agree, probably the hottest night game I can remember in Tiger Stadium (I'm 29 yrs old).

Right up there with one of the late 90's day games vs. Ole Miss for just miserable weather.

I'll always take cold and rain over heat and sun in Tiger Stadium.

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only 1 OOC loss in 30+ games

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That's so freakin' impressive.

Saban already has four OOC losses at Bama.