How do you feel going into this season compared to 2019 season?

Honestly, a bit more nervous.

Coming off 2018, it did seem like Burrow improved as the year went on, and I thought he could be good. Plus, we had Aranda's defense, returning a star safety and had an incoming stud at corner (who made waves during bowl practice).
Not to mention, we continued to be able to run the ball, as Brossette had continued the string of 1k backs we'd had, and people had talked about Edwards-Helaire in the past.
And we were returning a good bit of players from a 10-3 team.

Now, this year:
I actually have more hope for Nussmeier going into the season, than I did for Burrow... nobody expected Burrow to become what he did. I do expect Nuss to look like a 1st round pick, I didn't think Burrow would go that high.

I'm way less confident in the defense going into this year, and while I'm hoping Durham can be a 1k back I'm not exactly betting the house on it.

Feels more like going into the 2013 season tbh. Tons of potential and we can be very good. But not as confident as I was going into other seasons.

Somewhat the same.

In 2019 I saw the offseason changes and was optimistic given the reports from camp, but I was in the "show me, don't tell me category." I watched an LSU offense for the better part of a decade (including 2018) take a risk-averse, very bland approach to offense, so I needed to see the changes before I believed them. I was flying out of the country on opening day and didn't get to see the Georgia St. game. I read reports of great things but needed to see what it looked like vs. Texas. A week later I'm streaming the Texas game at 3:30 am in Europe and knew in the first half "this is different."

I think this team can be really good. I think the offense can be really good with a returning QB. I've seen LSU championship teams before and think the same pieces are in place for a run. However, I though the same ahead of the 2023 season with a returning QB. I didn't expect the defense to crash so badly.

As much as I'm excited to see LSU play Clemson vs. some non-descript directional school, this is a year I wish the Clemson game was in week 2. Not that I think Clemson is significantly better than LSU. It's just that no team has everything together in week 1 and playing on the road makes things so much tougher.

I feel just like with Texas in 2019 that we will have a good idea about this team after Saturday. I'm hopeful I can again say "this is different"

More confident in the team as a whole in 2019. Mainly due to the offensive line struggles.

More confident in the QB and offense going into this season but obviously we know how 2019 ended up but anyone who wasn't a tad bit skeptical is lying.

I'd say cautiously optimistic. LSU appears to have one of the tougher schedules...

Better. In 2019, I was still convinced bama had the west in a strangle hold.

Going into 2019, I had no inkling of how special that season was going to be, but I do recall thinking we would probably be pretty good and have a shot at the playoffs. I certainly didn't expect the offense to be that good, nor did I expect the defense to take a step back (at least during the early part of the season).

So, going into this year I feel similar - we should be pretty good and have a shot at the playoffs. Like everyone, the OL is a question mark (though I'm starting to feel like maybe it's going to really be a positive area by the end of the season) and I'm wondering if the Defense is getting over-hyped.

That said, I feel this way most seasons - pretty optimistic, there are some question marks, we could challenge for the playoffs.

quote:

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This year's defense will be ranked higher than our 2019 defense

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I hope so.

After the past couple seasons, I'm not confident in that just yet. We're coming off 2 straight seasons where, if the ball carrier broke the line of scrimmage or made 1 guy miss in space, it could be a TD. I know we've had sub-par safeties, but still- we haven't been even average at that part.

I'm a bit scared we might be in shootouts, where Nuss might get us 30+ pts a game and it may not be enough.

quote:

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or made 1 guy miss in space

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Sage Ryan is at Ole Miss

Honestly about the same, I 9-3, 10-2.

I had no clue the offense was going to be so dynamic. It was good but not great the year before with mostly the same cast of characters.

I think we might see that sort of breakout from our defense this year though. I think a lot of folks are sleeping on our D and I just think we have some dudes this year.