By the time the lights go down in Baton Rouge on Sept. 26, one of college football’s preseason playoff hopefuls will be staring at a brutal reality.
No. 23 Texas A&M and No.
10 LSU meet in a game that already feels like a season-turning point, with the loser taking on the kind of damage that is hard to absorb this early in the year. An 0-2 start in SEC play has never been good enough to reach the College Football Playoff, and that’s the hole one of these teams would be digging before the calendar even flips to October.
The road only gets uglier from there. If Texas A&M loses, the Aggies would still have No.
1 Texas, No. 8 Alabama, No.
14 Tennessee and No. 19 Missouri left on the schedule.
If LSU falls, the Tigers would still have No. 1 Texas, No.
8 Alabama, No. 14 Tennessee and No.
24 Mississippi State ahead. You can squint and imagine a path through the chaos of a new nine-game SEC slate, but the math is nasty.
Only one three-loss team, Alabama, has ever made the playoff field, and that third loss came in the SEC Championship. The loser Saturday night would need to run the table the rest of the way, and even that wouldn’t promise anything.
That’s a lot of pressure for two programs that poured serious money into these rosters.
LSU, now under first-year head coach Lane Kiffin, has what multiple sources have described as college football’s most expensive roster. The number is pushing $50 million, and the Tigers spent big with the expectation of winning immediately in Kiffin’s debut.
Two of the headline additions, quarterback Sam Leavitt and offensive tackle Jordan Seaton, were uneven in last weekend’s 32-24 loss to Ole Miss. LSU spent a combined eight figures on those two alone, and the return so far has not matched the investment.
An 0-2 start would land hard with LSU fans after the school beat out Ole Miss and Florida for Kiffin and handed him a 7-year, $91 million contract.
Texas A&M is spending at a similarly aggressive level, with a roster that lands around the $40 million range. The Aggies entered the season expecting a return trip to the playoff, leaning on what looked like one of the SEC’s better returning quarterbacks in Marcel Reed and the momentum built under Mike Elko.
Instead, Reed has looked like a step back, and replacing 10 players lost to the NFL Draft has been a struggle. Texas A&M opened the year ranked No. 8, then took a major hit after losing to unranked Kentucky as a 17-point favorite.
“We're excited to get out there on Saturday and prove that wasn't us last week,” Elko said this week.
A loss in Baton Rouge would not only cool off the fan base. It would also sharpen the questions around Elko’s choice to elevate Holmon Wiggins to offensive coordinator after Collin Klein left for Kansas State. Internal promotions can make sense on paper - familiarity matters - but A&M and Oregon have both shown that promoting someone from inside the building doesn’t guarantee the same results will follow.
And yet, for all the stress hanging over both sideline and stands, this is exactly the kind of September game that keeps the sport alive. There has been plenty of talk about whether playoff expansion would make regular-season games feel smaller. The 12-team format has already given more breathing room to teams that would have been finished after one slip in the old BCS or four-team days.
Still, here we are before October, and the stakes are massive.
The winner moves a step closer to the preseason playoff dream. The loser is left to explain a massive investment in a roster that may have missed the mark.
It would be another reminder that even a $40 million roster does not come with any guarantees, especially in a sport that has watched player compensation soar through NIL and revenue share money. Two seasons after Ohio State’s famous $20 million roster won it all, the spending has gone to another level.
That’s what makes Texas A&M-LSU feel so compelling: the pressure, the money, the rankings, and the possibility that one game can reshape everything.
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Still, the timing keeps the episode from fading quietly. Texas athletics officials said Manning and Sarkisian are expected to speak with Rowe in interviews ahead of the Tennessee game, putting the Longhorns back in a setting where the story can linger a little longer than they would like. For a program trying to keep its focus on the field, the next few days will be another test of how well it can move past a social-media moment without letting it become a bigger distraction. [Read more 🡒]