Relish these moments, LSU fans.
Savor them like a bite of juicy, perfectly seasoned filet mignon you’d love to eat for every meal for the rest of your life. The problem is, more than half the steak is gone.
As the LSU football team has burned through opponents like Sherman through the South, the 2011 Tigers have entered Greatest of All Time (G.O.A.T.) territory. With a pair of national titles in the last eight years, that’s a bold statement.
This team, however, has done it differently — with a sense of brutality not seen in the 2003 and the 2007 title teams. Through seven games, the Tigers’ margin of victory sits at a whopping 31.7 points per game.
We haven’t seen the patented LSU slip-up game yet. There’s no 25-23 gaffe at Ole Miss in 2009. No 43-37 triple-overtime loss at Kentucky in 2007. Not even a 16-14 nail-biting win against Tennessee in a game that shouldn’t have been close.
Instead, we get a 30-point massacre of detested Florida, a 35-point shorthanded drubbing of defending national champ Auburn and smackdowns of No. 3 Oregon and No. 16 West Virginia away from home.
If the top-ranked Tigers defeat No. 2 Alabama on Saturday, LSU is on the fast track to an undefeated season.
An undefeated season. Let that sink in for a hot minute.
Fans shouldn’t even blink about Western Kentucky or Ole Miss. Arkansas is somehow ranked in the top 10 despite playing underwhelming ball the entire season. This is the team Vanderbilt, albeit a better Commodores squad than years past, outplayed.
The Southeastern Conference championship would theoretically pit Saturday’s winner against a team from the dreadfully mediocre SEC East. Breeze.
How hallowed is undefeated?
The 2003 squad posted a 13-1 record en route to the BCS title, while the 2007 team became the first two-loss national champs. The last time LSU went undefeated was the fabled 1958 national title season.
Since then, fans have seen more ups and downs than a yo-yo. Curley Hallman saw success as the Tigers’ head coach about as long as Justin Bieber lasted backstage.
Sure, Cholly Mac had his moments. So did Mike Archer and Bill Arnsparger.
Gerry DiNardo showed some promise but fizzled more than a shaken-up Dr Pepper. His highly touted defensive coordinator, Lou Tepper, somehow thought installing a defense that takes six years to learn would be applicable on a team where players are eligible for four years.
It wasn’t always peachy.
Then Nick Saban showed up, complete with his “process,” plethora of hand motions and “a’ights.” He turned around the program, got his crystal ball and followed the money to Miami.
The rest is recent memory. Success, it seems, is constant — for now.
This squad is flat-out talented. With a win in Tuscaloosa, Ala., on Saturday, this team has a chance to be the G.O.A.T. Just the chance to be the best is something to value and remember.
Don’t take it for granted.
Chris Branch is a 21-year-old mass communication senior from Baton Rouge.
 
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Contact Chris Branch at [email protected]