Photo: Johntay Cook II, September 12, 2026, at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Petre Thomas-Imagn Images.
LSU arrives in Oxford on Saturday ranked seventh to Ole Miss’s eighth and favored by between 2.5 and 3.5 points, with the money line moving from -130 to -144 since Sunday. A CBS Sports survey of more than 50 industry figures ranked the Tigers’ roster the most expensive in college football history, north of $40 million and perhaps $55 million. Ole Miss came back in the upper 30s.
Locked On Ole Miss host Steven Willis argued that all of it is Lane Kiffin’s problem, not Ole Miss’s. Kiffin left a program that had just won 13 games for one coming off 7-6. “Nobody makes that move for football,” Willis said, and the decision “comes with a bill.” Saturday is the first invoice.
Willis said a 2-0 top-10 team that drops a one-possession game in Week 3 wakes up Sunday still in the playoff conversation, while a Kiffin loss as the higher-ranked favorite, on ABC with College GameDay in the Grove, defines his season. Asked on national radio whether Saturday is a must-win for Kiffin, one prominent host answered: “Yes. Yes. Yes.”
Willis named LSU’s tight end as the player who decides the night: 6-foot-7, 242 pounds, 33 catches for 433 yards and seven touchdowns last season, and 104 yards on six catches against Louisiana Tech from six alignments, including quarterback in the Wildcat. The design attacks discipline, not talent, and Pete Golding has twice described “an angle issue” and defenders “not having sound gap control.”
Willis is watching Suntarine Perkins to stay home on the backside of that motion. He dismissed the week’s safety storyline and pointed to Golding’s read of the crowd: noise breaks helmet-to-helmet communication, leaving LSU’s players to decide for themselves. A win, Willis said, would put Golding at 4-1 against ranked opponents through six games.
Adapted from the September 16, 2026 episode of Locked On Ole Miss, hosted by Steven Willis, part of the Locked On Podcast Network. Watch the full episode.