The LSU offense is an interesting one to preview this year. To this point, they’re only scoring 25.5 points per game, and that ultimately got Brian Kelly fired (and OC Joe Sloan was given the can a couple
hours later). It’s not been good by any stretch, and there’s been a lot of issues… but the caveat is that there are a lot of good players than can make impressive individual plays.
Sloan’s offense was mostly disappointing in Baton Rouge the last two seasons after Mike Denbrock left following the 2023 season. This is what I said about Sloan’s scheme (and his QB) a year ago:
The scheme is much the same as it was under Denbrock: pass-first, lots of mesh routes, sideline comebacks, and sideline shots. The running game is mostly new-age draw plays – outside zones, sweeps, and counters from shotgun, and a fair amount of RB screens. But it’s ultimately a QB-driven offense that gives the QB a lot of leeway to dictate how most plays go.
That QB is Garrett Nussmeier. The son of the former Alabama offensive coordinator, Nuss is completing 62.5% of his passes at 7.9 yards per attempt in his first year as a starter. His 20 touchdowns are impressive, but the 9 interceptions in only half a season is concerning. Essentially, Nuss is a risk-taker. He doesn’t get sacked – he’s great at avoiding pressure, and he will scramble to make throws. A lot of that is him avoiding a rush and hitting a quick curl over the middle, but he’s just as likely to fling one to a receiver on a sideline comeback or down the field. It’s something that can get him into trouble.
Schematically, the Tigers have been much the same this year – comebacks, mesh routes, and occasional predetermined shot plays.
However, Sloan is now out, and Alex Atkins is taking over as OC. What we don’t know yet is how much that scheme will change over the course of a bye week.
Atkins’ resume to this point is that he was the OC at Florida State from 2022-2024. He had some really nice success in 2023 before the Seminoles had a disaster season a year ago that resulted in him getting fired. It’s hard to know just what he’s going to try to do with LSU’s offense, but we do know that he relied heavily on counters, sweeps and other outside run plays that involved pulling offfensive linemen as lead blockers. He also ran a lot of QB runs and RPO plays, but that was with a running QB, Jordan Travis, and that’s likely not going to be the case with Nussmeier.
Speaking of Nuss, the presason Heisman contender has probably been playing injured for most of the season, but nobody will really admit anything. His ball seems to have lost some of its zip, and he doesn’t act like he trusts his arm very much, so he seems to be defaulting to give up check downs for minimal yardage or just eating sacks.
He’s dropped to 6.8 yards per attempt this year, down from 7.7 a year ago, and while he has cut down on the interceptions, it’s come at the cost of reduced yards, reduced TDs, and, most notably, a massive increase in sacks. Nuss took all of 15 sacks in all of 2024, and he’s already up to 14 so far this season with 4 games to go. And it’s not because of blocking: the Tigers are actually doing a little better at allowing less pressure this year – but Nuss’s pressure-to-sack rate has doubled from 9.8% in 2024 to 19.2% in 2025. He’s just not getting the ball out and taking sacks.
His receiver group consists of a group of solid #2 receivers, all of whom have impressive YAC ability. Barion Brown transferred over from Kentucky after three solid seasons with the Wildcats, including an All-American and multiple All-SEC selections as a kick returner, and he now leads the team with 36 catches and has 361 yards. Alongside him is Alabama transfer Aaron Anderson. The pocket-sized receiver leads in yardage with 382. Anderson and Brown both excel in short-t0-medium yardage with the ball in their hands, and often take 5-yard mesh routes, make the first man miss, and pick up 9-10 yards.
Past that, Zavion Thomas has 267 yards (plus 15 carries in the run game), and sophomore Kyle Parker is quickly getting more and more play time as a sure-handed possession guy. Still, all four of their top receivers are under 5’11”, so there seems to be a lot of redundant skill sets.
Then there’s the tight ends. Trey’Dez Green was a top-50 recruit a year ago and is really starting to make a mark in year 2. He’s 6’7” 240 and has 21 catches for 264 yards with 4 TDs. He’s made some really impressive 1v1 post up grabs in the endzone,and is getting some early talk as a 2027 NFL Draft top prospect.
The other tight end is senior Bauer Sharp, who transferred in from Oklahoma after grabbing 42 catches for the Sooners last year. Sharp is more of the veteran presence, but LSU uses both him and Green in heavy formations quite often.
As far as the rushing game, the Tigers’ stats look a little worse than they actually are because of Nussmeier’s sacks. But their top three backs, Caden Durham, Harlem Berry, and Ju’Juan Johnson are all averaging a shade under 5 yards per carry. Durham was the leader a year ago and was early on this year, but an ankle injury a month ago saw freshman Harlem Berry take over the starting role, and Berry seems to entrenched himself above Durham even with both healthy.
Berry is a smaller back at 195 pounds, but he’s got impressive quickness and a knack for making linebackers whiff in small spaces. Give him a little space, and he turns a 3-yard gain into an 8-yard gain. It’s not been particularly explosive, but the run game as a whole has been decently reliable for the Tigers.
Now, all of that sounds good (and there is a lot of good there), but the LSU offensive line has been, well, bad.
Tackles Carius Curne and Weston Davis almost got Nussmeier killed against Texas A&M, and guard Coen Echols has had plenty of struggles. Center Braelin Moore has been pretty well the lone bright spot for them, but, overall, their pass and run blocking have just been generally bad all season.
And that, combined with Nuss’s hidden injury, has just turned the offense into a sack and checkdown fest that wound up getting the coaches fired.
I think that this, overall, is a strong schematic advantage for Alabama’s defense. The Tide secondary has excelled for two seasons against the mesh and curl routes that LSU has thrived on, and Yhonzae Pierre’s speed rush is going to give the LSU OTs fits. I do think that the Tigers will expect this and go for a run-heavy approach to see if Alabama has fixed some of their edge-setting issues from earlier in the year. They have the RB talent to do some damage there, but do they have the horses on the OL? And will it work when they don’t have a QB that is a running threat?
A year ago, Kane Wommack totally flummoxed a much more healthy version of this same offense, so I expect more of the same. As long as Alabama doesn’t blow too many tackles in the 5-10 yard area of the field, then I think they make this a long day for the LSU offense.
Lets go with 17 points for the Tigers.
