Where Does the 2019 LSU Football Team Stack Up With Some of College Football's Historic Past Teams?
The 2019 LSU Tigers will forever go down as one of the greatest college football teams of all-time, but where does The Athletic place them in their 25 most dominant college football teams of the past 50 years list?
Totaling seven top-10 wins and a Heisman Trophy winner en route to an unprecedented national championship campaign, LSU sits at No. 4 behind 1995 Nebraska, 2001 Miami, and 1971 Nebraska.
But what’s their reasoning behind the ranking?
“The Tigers beat five of the final top eight teams in the AP poll, and they did so in dominant fashion,” said Matt Brown of The Athletic. “Four of those wins came by an average of 23.3 points, and the other was on the road versus Alabama. No national champion in the past 50 years amassed more wins against teams that finished in the top 10 (five) or ranked (seven), and no national champion averaged more yards per play (7.9).”
While the Auburn game was close, no contest ever felt in doubt, and in order to beat LSU, you had to outscore them, something nobody was able to accomplish the entire season. With respect to the three other teams listed ahead of the 2019 Tigers, would they have been able to outscore Joe Burrow and the most prolific offense in the history of the sport? My guess is no.
In fact, LSU dethroned the defending champion Clemson Tigers by three scores in New Orleans, and they could’ve made it four if it wasn’t for a courteous kneel to end regulation. They were dominant in everything they did, and they sucked the suspense out of the air in nearly every game they played because of it.
Ed Orgeron’s squad became the first team in history to beat each of the top four teams in the preseason AP poll, while the seven top-10 wins recorded throughout the season marked an NCAA record.
“The LSU defense was vulnerable, but the offense more than made up for it by undergoing a revolution behind the Heisman-winning Burrow, stud receivers Chase and Justin Jefferson and first-round pick RB Clyde Edwards-Helaire,” the article stated.
While the defense did show some vulnerabilities down the stretch, a healthy Grant Delpit made the difference in returning to a dominant unit. Against Texas A&M, and throughout the playoff, LSU’s defense looked vintage, putting all the pieces of the puzzle together for a run at the title.
“In the SEC title game and two Playoff games, LSU averaged 600 yards and Burrow threw 16 TDs and zero INTs, finishing off a season in which he completed 76.3 percent of his passes for 5,671 yards with 60 TDs and six INTs. Burrow had the best pure passing season of all time, driving one of the most unstoppable offenses of all time.”
