Baton Rouge Turns Out For LSU Parade

It's pretty cold, but it's pretty sweet, too.
About 25,000 fans braved chilly temps tday to celebrate LSU's national football championship.
"I got chills when I was carrying that flag," star defensive tackle Glenn Dorsey said after the 75-minute event Saturday afternoon in Tiger Stadium. "Today was a day of closure for my four years at LSU. It has been unbelievable."
Dorsey hadn't had a bad year.
Dorsey won the Outland Trophy (interior lineman), the Lombardi Award (outstanding lineman), the Bronko Nagurski Trophy (defensive player), and the Lott Trophy (on-field performance and personal character).
He was the last player introduced at the party to celebrate the Tigers' 38-24 victory over Ohio St. on Jan. 7. All but three members of the 2007 team - Jacob Hester, Chevis Jackson and Andrew Decker - were there.

“To come out here in the cold, it says a lot as a whole,” LSU defensive end Kirston Pittman said. “I don’t think I would have come out here in this cold weather, but it shows the love of the people of LSU and how much they appreciate us — and how much we really appreciate them.”
The 2007 national championship flag was raised at the end of the ceremony. National championship trophies from four organizations were presented to LSU coach Les Miles and team captains Dorsey, Patrick Fisher, Matt Flynn and Craig Steltz.
The four trophies were the MacArthur Bowl National Championship, the Football Writers Trophy, The Associated Press Trophy and the BCS National Championship Trophy.
Southeastern Conference commissioner and BCS co-ordinator Mike Slive made the presentation for the BCS trophy and his league's championship trophy.
"This is the third time I've had the privilege of sharing the podium with these great athletes and these great coaches," Slive told the crowd. "I can tell you there is a special aura about them. They have earned your respect and your admiration as they have mine."
Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal and East Baton Rouge Parish Mayor-President Kip Holden also appeared at the event.

LSU Not Taking Buckeyes Lightly

Phone call from SEC coaches to LSU: "DON'T PHONE IT IN!"
LSU has come all the way up the mountain, at the cusp of a second national title in 5 years, and LSU knows that the league is depending on them.
As the season wore on, injuries to key players mounted and the gap between the Tigers and their opponents closed, especially during a string of matchups against other bowl-bound Southeastern Conference foes. There were narrow victories over Florida, Auburn and Alabama. There were triple-overtime losses to Kentucky and Arkansas. LSU also needed a second-half comeback in its 21-14 victory over Tennessee in the SEC championship game.
Top-ranked Ohio State is a six-point dog to LSU in the BCS Championship. Illinois is on the wrong end of a 14-point spread for its Rose Bowl date with USC. Florida is picked to beat Michigan in the Capital One Bowl, Tennessee over Wisconsin in the Outback, Boston College over Michigan State in the Champs Sports and Oklahoma State over Indiana in the Insight.
The Tigers (11-2) expect key players to be in much better shape by the time the BCS championship game against Ohio State (11-1) kicks off on Jan. 7.
"I know that the lineup shuffles a little bit that way at the end of the year where you've had to play week after week versus quality opponents and it takes its toll," LSU coach Les Miles said Monday, his team's first day at practice after a couple weeks off for final exams.
"There's no question that at some point in time, teams are more healthy and less healthy and it's a testimony to our football team that we win two games with our second-team quarterback. A number of times, our (starting) defensive line is on the sidelines watching and yet this football team finds a way to win," Miles said. "We'll certainly enjoy the rest. We'll certainly improve our health. We're looking forward to returning to freshness, if you will."
Not since 2002, when the Big Ten went 5-2 in a bowl season that included Ohio State’s win over Miami in the BCS Championship, has the conference finished above .500 in the postseason. Last year’s 2-5 mark, punctuated by Michigan’s blowout loss to USC in the Rose Bowl and Ohio State’s debacle against Florida in the BCS Championship, capped a three-year run of futility in which the league posted the worst bowl record of any BCS conference.
One of the most significant injuries involved All-American defensive tackle Glenn Dorsey, who played the second half of the season with a sprained right knee. Dorsey was injured on an illegal chop-block against Auburn.
LSU was fortunate to have the next weekend off and Dorsey didn't miss a game, although he was not the same. His ability to explode into the backfield appeared diminished and his role appeared to shift to plugging holes in the line on running plays.
"Injuries do that," LSU defensive tackle Marlon Favorite said. "I'm sure he wanted to rush and push to his full extent, but due to his injury he couldn't, so in his mind he was thinking, 'I have to do what I can.' He did that well."
Dorsey finished as LSU's third-leading tackler with 64 stops, including six sacks and 11.5 tackles for losses. He won a trophy case-full of SEC and national awards.
Dorsey said LSU's defense is eager to send a message of how well it can play when key players are all fresh.
"We're real excited. Everybody started talking down on us when we started giving up points on defense," Dorsey said. "We tried not to listen to that because, I mean, nobody knows what's going on in our locker room. So for us to have an opportunity to be healthy, we can come out and do what we're supposed to do and do what we know how to do."
On offense, LSU's top wide receiver, Early Doucet, was sidelined for most of five games with a groin injury. Starting quarterback Matt Flynn missed an early season start with an ankle sprain and the SEC championship game with a shoulder injury.
Backup quarterback Ryan Perrilloux won both starts in Flynn's absence, but if Perrilloux plays against Ohio State, it will be more by design than necessity.
"A lot of our guys were nicked up. That's the fact of the matter and everyone knows that," said Favorite, who played through injuries to both ankles this season. "You give us time to rest and get back on our feet? This is my first time ever dealing with injuries like this and I feel better already."

Why Cam Cameron will be LSU's next coach (And Les will go to U-M)

Seems there's 6 degrees of separation in the coaching universe that is LSU.
Les Miles is being brought up as the next University of Michigan coach following Lloyd Carr's debacle against Appalachian State last weekend.
See it all starts with Les Miles. He was an assistant at Michigan in 1987, where he met his wife, Kathy. She was an assistant coach for the women's basketball team. They were just friends for more than a year but started dating about a year into the relationship. When they finally scheduled a date, Kathy arrived late. Ole "Lover" Les thought she was standing him up so there relationship kind of cooled. But that's when a colleague, fellow Michigan assistant coach Cam Cameron, jumped in and got the two back together by drawing up a plan of "X's and O's". Cameron and Miles shared an office back then and he was privy to the two's relationship details.
Nearly five years later in 1993 Les and Kathy got married. Cameron was, quite naturally, in the wedding. Also in the wedding as a groomsman was a guy named Gerry DiNardo. DiNardo, who would coach at LSU a few years later, only to be replaced by Sata — I mean, Saban, Nick Saban, met his wife through Les Miles while both were assistants in the 1980s at Colorado. A bitter blow for DiNardo would turn into a certain relief when Les MIles would replace Nick Saban as coach at LSU. Saban would jaunt to the Miami Dolphins. Cameron would then replace Saban at Miami. Got all that?
To add more to the mix, Cam Cameron, before heading to Miami, would land in San Diego as quarterback coach and oversee the rise of a star quarterback in Drew Brees. After Brees injures his arm at the end of the 2005 season he is brought into Miami for workouts — by coach Nick Saban, who doesn't trust his shoulder. We all know how this turns out.
Now, Les Miles will return to Michigan at season's end (with Lloyd Carr as A.D.), Cam Cameron will join LSU and Jerry DiNardo will end up with the Miami job. Got all that (whew!)?