Louisiana State coach Lane Kiffin defended adding former NFL players to his roster in Baton Rouge after rival coaches criticized the strategy.
Former Cleveland Browns and Philadelphia Eagles tight end Dae'Quan Wright participated in a walk-through practice on Monday for the 11th-ranked Tigers as LSU prepares to host Clemson on Saturday.
Whether Wright or other offseason NFL additions - defensive lineman Zxavian Harris and defensive back Blake Cotton - will ever suit up for LSU remains in doubt due to ongoing litigation. The Southeastern Conference (SEC) passed a rule last week barring former professional players from returning to the league, but a Texas judge promptly put the measure on hold. The SEC rule covers all sports, expanding on a football-only ban adopted earlier the same day by the Big Ten.
Kiffin was not about to allow criticism to stop him from bringing in players like Wright, who played for him at Mississippi last season, emphasizing that his primary focus is on his locker room rather than public perception.
"I feel like my decisions should always be made in the best interest of the players that sit in this team room and not for my reputation, and how my decisions play in national media and other fan bases," Kiffin said. "I've never been that way and that could be wrong."
Kiffin said that if college players are being paid like professionals, college programs should not hesitate to make late roster additions in much the same way NFL teams do. He also met with LSU team leaders about whether to welcome recent pros back to college just days before their season opener.
"Every one of them was emphatic about, 'If they can help us win, bring 'em,'" Kiffin said. "That made me feel a little better. This is how it works at the next level. This is how the real world works."
Kiffin noted that the SEC knows Wright joined LSU at least for practice. Because Monday was Wright's first day on the field, NCAA mandated seven-day acclimatization protocol rules prevent him from playing against Clemson on Saturday.
However, former Notre Dame defensive lineman Junior Tuihalamaka, who did not sign with an NFL team but is suing for a fifth year of NCAA eligibility, started practicing earlier. Defensive end Jack Pyburn, who spent training camp with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers after playing for LSU last season, was among the players suing the NCAA and was expected to return to the Tigers after being cut. Instead, Pyburn was claimed off waivers on Monday by the Kansas City Chiefs.
Opposition from SEC leaders
University presidents around the SEC have expressed a high level of frustration with LSU since Friday, when a Louisiana judge included the conference in his temporary restraining order against the NCAA, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. A court hearing is scheduled for Thursday in Baton Rouge.
Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian, who previously worked on the same staff with Kiffin at Southern California, echoed those frustrations and condemned taking players off NFL rosters.
"Our presidents got this right in the Southeastern Conference," Sarkisian said. "The fact that somebody out there is going to take a player off an NFL roster and tell somebody who's been on their college team for nine months go kick rocks? That doesn't sit well with me. I think that is wrong; that is morally wrong."
Kiffin noted that LSU has not broken any conference rules yet, as SEC teams must submit their final 2026 rosters the day before their season openers, which is Friday for most league schools.
"We'll wait until this week to see if there's any more guidance" from the courts, Kiffin said, discounting whether the surrounding chaos might distract his team. "I've lived with chaos for a long time. We're going to have chaos, but we're going to have controlled chaos and our team is going to understand why we do what we do. It doesn't matter if national media doesn't understand, or other fan bases." Kiffin added that Mississippi won its final five games while speculation swirled around whether he would leave for LSU.
Villain identity and basketball roster moves
New artwork in the lobby of LSU's Football Operations Center displays the back of an LSU player standing in the shadows of a stadium tunnel with the words: "If you want to win at the highest level, you have to become a villain in someone else's story."
ESPN college football analyst Paul Finebaum told The New York Post that Kiffin has embraced that identity.
"He's the biggest villain I think the sport has had in modern time," Finebaum said. "It is a great story on many levels, and the person happiest with that is Lane Kiffin. It's who he is. I think he's a great coach, but he's a better puppeteer and entertainer."
Finebaum noted that no coach had ever walked away from a title contender mid-season as Kiffin did at Ole Miss last year: "Quite frankly, only Lane Kiffin could do that... and he got away with it."
The push for former pros extends beyond the football program. The SEC rule, which also applies to players signed by the NBA G League, impacts players like former St. John's star R.J. Luis Jr. On Monday, Luis won a court ruling allowing him to sign with Will Wade's basketball program at LSU despite having briefly been under contract with the Utah Jazz and Boston Celtics of the NBA. LSU offered no immediate comment on the ruling.
Kiffin suggested on Monday that if LSU did not take newly eligible players, rival programs would. However, the rules passed by the SEC and Big Ten now prevent all 34 member schools across the top two conferences from signing former professional players.
Speaking on ESPN's "The Pat McAfee Show" on Tuesday, Kiffin argued that LSU was following court orders that cleared more than 100 athletes across multiple sports.
"Over 100 athletes in multiple sports were cleared and said you could go play. That's a court order," Kiffin said. "If you think back on all the different court orders of great players that were granted - whether that's Diego Pavia or, now, Trinidad Chambliss that were allowed to play a sixth year, we followed all court orders. I think you get into a really interesting situation as a conference if you're now saying, 'Well, we're not going to follow this court order.'"
Widespread lawsuits and college sports uncertainty
The eligibility battle comes as nearly 400 athletes sue the NCAA and other defendants, seeking additional eligibility and claiming the organization's 5-in-5 rule approved in June is unfair because it excludes members of the high school Class of 2022. More than 30 lawsuits, several in federal court, are currently active. Some involve athletes who signed professional contracts, which prompted Power Four conferences to ban returning pros and led to further legal filings.
Conferences are establishing differing penalties for non-compliance. The Big Ten's penalties for violating its rule include a half-season suspension for the head coach and a fine for the university. The SEC has not revealed specific penalties, though commissioner Greg Sankey is expected to have wide latitude. The Atlantic Coast Conference and Big 12 are scheduled to discuss the issue on Wednesday.
Wake Forest athletic director John Currie criticized signing players out of pro camps in a text message to The Associated Press.
"I don't think anybody in our league likes the idea of taking away opportunities from existing college students and graduating high school players, which is exactly what is happening when a school signs a player out of an NFL camp to their team," Currie wrote.
Leagues and the NCAA are using the crisis to push for the Protect College Sports Act, a Senate bill that would grant the NCAA legal protection against eligibility lawsuits. However, the bill remains weeks away from a vote as the football season begins on Saturday with a featured game in Ireland between TCU and North Carolina.
Coaches expressed frustration over the governance vacuum. TCU head coach Sonny Dykes called college football a "rudderless ship," adding, "I don't know who's in charge of football anymore." Duke coach Manny Diaz added that Power Four conferences must present a unified front, stating, "You wouldn't run any other type of corporation, organization, anything else, the way we're being run right now."
Louisiana State University is a public institution in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, competing in the SEC. Head coach Lane Kiffin previously led programs at Mississippi, Tennessee, Southern California, Florida Atlantic, and the Oakland Raiders before taking over the Tigers this season.
