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The 2015 LSU Tigers had their share of flaws. When you examine them more closely — the passing game issues, flaws with the run defense — you can trace them back to one root cause: inexperience.
It sounds like an excuse, but it’s true. LSU played a staggering number of freshmen in 2014 for such a blue-blood program. In all, 20 of them got onto the field in at least one game, and 13 played in at least six games.
Despite those big freshman numbers, LSU is still losing its fair share of players from last year’s roster. Five of the 22 regular starters were seniors, and another three decided to leave school early for the draft.
Here’s how LSU’s starters broke down by class last year, based on the players who was starting at each position at the end of the season:
- Seniors — 5
- Juniors — 7
- Sophomores — 7
- Freshmen — 3
As you can see, the majority of LSU’s starters were either freshmen or sophomores. Considering the mass exodus of draft-eligible players from the 2012 and 2013 teams, it’s no surprise to see so few senior starters hanging around.
How will LSU’s class breakdown look for 2015? We don’t yet know how several position battles will play out. For everyone’s sanity, we’ll assume Brandon Harris takes over at quarterback, as well as a few other educated guesses on who will get the starting nods.
- Seniors — 5
- Juniors — 8
- Sophomores — 5
- Freshmen — 4
Would you look at that? Despite losing eight starters from last year, LSU will be nearly as young as 2015 as it was in 2014. The freshmen it puts on the field should be talented. The four we’re pegging as starter: fullback David Ducre, guard Maea Teuhema, defensive end Arden Key and cornerback Kevin Toliver. Two of those four are already on campus, giving them a little more experience than LSU’s freshman starters from a year ago.
Many of the sophomores and juniors pressed into duty in 2014 did so with very little experience. Travin Dural, Anthony Jennings, Kendell Beckwith, and even early defection Jalen Collins had very little starting experience coming into the year. That obviously changes in 2015.
The Tigers are still going to be young, but not as dangerously inexperienced as they were in the 8-5 2014 campaign.
A former freelance journalist from Philadelphia, Brett has made the trek down to SEC country to cover the greatest conference in college football.
