LSU football’s wild rally could change Brian Kelly tenure

• LSU kept its College Football Playoff hopes afloat with a dramatic win over Ole Miss. What’s it mean for Brian Kelly? That’s tough to say.
• LSU leapfrogs Ole Miss in playoff pecking order.
• LSU defense grows a spine, Garrett Nussmeier comes up clutch, and Lane Kiffin’s Rebels wilt again.

BATON ROUGE, La. – Remember Saturday night.

If LSU scratches and claws and muddies and escapes and fights its way into the College Football Playoff, remember the night the No. 10 Tigers won a game they never led until the final play.

If this 29-26 overtime win over No. 8 Ole Miss galvanizes Brian Kelly’s tenure, and he proves himself worth that $95 million investment LSU made three years ago, remember the night his defense grew a spine and his quarterback fought through the tough times.

And when it was finished, LSU fired off enough fireworks that it could’ve been Independence Day, while fans stormed the field. Never mind that the Tigers were just a slight underdog.

This improbable escape warranted celebration.

“These moments don’t come often in life, for sure,” LSU linebacker Whit Weeks said. “It was fun.”

It became a turning-point victory in Kelly’s turning-point third season.

Or, it provided LSU a gulp of excitement before the bottom falls out in the second half of the schedule.

I’m not sure which it’ll prove to be. I could believe either.

LSU’s six remaining games are against SEC competition. There’s not a game remaining LSU (5-1) can’t win – or a game it couldn’t lose.

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And the Tigers could be the SEC’s second-best team or its seventh-best team. I’m unconvinced there’s much difference.

“This league is wide open,” LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier said. “I think we took a huge step tonight.”

It’s wide open behind Texas, anyway.

LSU football leapfrogs Ole Miss in playoff pecking order

As for LSU’s cardiac cats, they’re still a little rough around the edges, but so are most SEC teams. They’re improving, they battle, they’ve got a quarterback, and a few good receivers, and their defense found a pulse against a top-10 opponent, and so, what the heck, why can’t the Tigers make the playoff? They’ve got about as good of a chance as a number of other teams that sit on one loss.

They’ve got a better chance of making the playoff than Ole Miss (5-2). I know that much.

“We’re real,” Nussmeier said afterward. “The Tigers are real. I think we proved that tonight. There were struggles, and there were mistakes, but we found a way to win the game.”

Kelly raved about LSU’s performance – not because it was perfect, but because it wasn’t, and the Tigers nonetheless hung within striking distance until they finally broke through while Ole Miss caved. He raved about a defense that supplied six sacks. He raved about his quarterback who shrugged off two interceptions, plus a slew of incompletions, and threw touchdown passes on his final two tosses.

“This team is getting better,” Kelly said.

That’s a fair assessment, and the same could be said of Kelly’s 2022 Tigers, who lost their season opener before upsetting Alabama and reaching the SEC Championship Game.

LSU beat Alabama that season on a 2-point conversion. Given another chance Saturday to win a rivalry game with a 2-point try, Kelly changed course. He didn’t want a single play to decide this outcome.

“I just felt like our guys worked too hard to get back in that game” Kelly said, “that I didn’t want to go for two in an all-or-nothing situation.”

So, after Nussmeier brought LSU to within a point with a fourth-down touchdown dart to Aaron Anderson, Kelly elected for an extra point to tie the game and force overtime.

Count Weeks among those happiest that Kelly didn’t order up a 2-point conversion.

“I was glad to get to play some more ball,” Weeks said. “Shoot, we don’t get to play again ‘til next Saturday. I like playing more football.”

LSU’s defense, which played well throughout the second half, vindicated Kelly’s decision.

As the crowd reached decibels it hadn’t hit all night, the Rebels moved in reverse during their overtime possession and needed a 57-yard field goal to salvage points.

Mission accomplished for LSU’s defense. And then …

“It’s go time,” LSU wide receiver Kyren Lacy said.

Winning time, too.

Nussmeier tossed to Lacy on the first play of LSU’s overtime possession.

Comeback complete.

Garrett Nussmeier delivers for LSU in clutch

The more the Tigers played, the better they looked.

The game remained scoreless after the first quarter, but LSU could consider itself fortunate to not be trailing 17-0. Ole Miss’ Tre Harris dropped what should have been an 81-yard touchdown pass, and that costly drop was aside from two first-quarter red-zone trips that produced no points.

“We commanded the majority of the game,” Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin said. “… They are a good team, and we are a good team, but we should’ve won that game.”

Which must make it all the more maddening for Kiffin that the Rebels lost.

Ole Miss spent a pretty penny – bundles of pennies, in fact – to improve its defense via a transfer haul, and although the unit undeniably improved, this marks twice that it’s failed to deliver game-winning stops in critical moments.

Just two weeks ago, Kentucky used a fourth-and-7 completion to keep alive a drive that ended with a game-winning touchdown.

Nussmeier needed two fourth-down completions just to tie this game, then one 25-yard strike to Lacy to win it.

“We’re a gritty bunch. We’re going to keep fighting to the very end,” Weeks said. “We knew the whole game, we’re not losing this ballgame.”

If Weeks knew that while Ole Miss controlled much of the game, then credit his faith. And credit the Tigers’ resilience.

This is the night Kelly’s tenure took off. Or, not.

But, it’s certainly the night LSU pulled off a most improbable comeback, preserved its playoff hopes, and put Ole Miss’ own aspirations on life support.

Blake Toppmeyer is the USA TODAY Network’s national college football columnist. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter @btoppmeyer.

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