I'll weigh in on a few of your points.
First of all, the Clemson game...perhaps I'm one of the few AU fans that will admit the "Clemson Effect" goes both ways. We are ranked as highly as we are and people talked about our offense as much as they did based solely on our performance against Clemson--the same Clemson team that many people said was overrated when you guys embarassed them. IMO, it goes both ways. We beat an overrated Clemson team which sparked the thought of "promise" of the new offense, blah blah blah. You see where I'm going with this.
As for LSU being a quality offense--perhaps they have some talent but I am unimpressed by their performance against North Texas and App. State. I think we can all agree North Texas is a terrible team and LSU's QBs were a combined 20/45 for 209 yards and a pick. Andrew Hatch was the JV QB at Harvard before transferring to LSU. CTT will force LSU's running backs to beat us and we, as we usually do, still have a solid rush defense. Our defense will keep us in the game.
As for our offense....there's really no excuse. Poor execution all around. Chris Todd hasn't looked terrible but he's far from a superstar. Kodi Burns had his playing time reduced by a cut on his shin that required 80 stitches to close (that happens against ULM). Stupid penalties and fumbles.
All that being said, I'm not terribly optimistic. I truly feel we do have a chance against LSU. Our defense will keep us in the game and if our offense can find an identity and put up some points and keep the D off the field long enough to actually get a rest, we'll win the football game. All the talent in the world on defense won't matter if the offense commits as many turnovers and penalties as we did against MSU and USM.
LSU has looked good on offense but let's keep in mind it was against an FCS school and a very, very lower rung FBS school.
