Former LSU football head coach Ed Orgeron is returning to the program, LSU announced Wednesday night.

Orgeron will take up a role as a special assistant for recruiting and defense under recently-minted head coach Lane Kiffin’s staff.

He served as the head coach from 2016 to 2021 and was at the helm of the program when it won its fourth national championship in 2019.

His unbeaten 2019 season, along with the Larose, Louisiana, native’s deep Cajun accent and larger-than-life personality, canonized “Coach O” as a beloved figure in the landscape of LSU athletics.

A series of poor results to open the 2020s led to Orgeron and LSU parting ways at the end of the 2021 season, which made way for the hiring of Brian Kelly as the LSU football head coach.

This hiring decision is not just a reunion for Orgeron and LSU, but for Orgeron and Kiffin. Orgeron worked on Kiffin’s staff as a defensive line coach during Kiffin’s tenures at Tennessee and USC from 2009 to 2013.

Orgeron became the interim head coach at USC in 2013 following Kiffin’s dismissal as the Trojans’ head coach. As his next move, he joined LSU as a defensive line coach in 2015 before earning the head coaching position.

Due to the two’s linked history and Orgeron’s past at LSU, rumors swirled that Orgeron would find a place back in Baton Rouge as early as the ink drying on Kiffin’s contract to become the next LSU head coach.

In a statement released through LSU athletics on Wednesday, Kiffin said, “I’m excited to bring Coach Orgeron back to LSU. He brings us tremendous value with his ability to recruit elite players nationally, but especially the impact he can have for us recruiting the great state of Louisiana.”