Breaking down what prompted Brian Kelly to fire entire defensive staff

Brian Kelly wasted no time taking care of LSU‘s defensive woes from the 2023 season, and did so with the simplest solution: He fired every member of his defensive staff, including defensive coordinator Matt House.

According to Bengal Tiger’s Shea Dixon, who joined On3’s Andy Staples show on Wednesday, believes Kelly was more than justified by his decision after his defensive staff’s showing this year. Even if it’s going to cost his program around $6 million.

“When you have the No. 1 offense in college football — they will finish that way — the defense finishes No. 108,” Dixon revealed to Staples. “If you’re wondering how many teams are out there, there are 133. The difference between 108 and 133 is not that many yards. So, in reality, you’re looking at a team that has the best offense in college football and the worst defense — and it costs them games.

Dixon made sure to point out the fact that the Tigers amassed over 600 yards of total offense and scored 49 points against Ole Miss in September — and still lost. In Dixon’s words, that should never happen.

Take away that loss — LSU is a two-loss team likely headed to the Cotton Bowl to replace Missouri. Instead, their Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Jayden Daniels opted out of the ReliaQuest Bowl after a disappointing finish to the season for the Tigers as a whole. That game against Ole Miss should have been won by LSU based on the stat sheet alone. Now, that loss would probably be the difference in them making the expanded 12-team playoff in 2024.

Brian Kelly wasn’t willing to take that chance again.

“[Brian Kelly] went to the SEC, which he knew would be expanding and bringing in more teams — because he wanted to prove he could win a championship and do it at the highest level,” Dixon continued. “Everyone he fired was handpicked. These were all of his hires two years ago. He didn’t retain nobody and then two years later to say, ‘I’m firing every single one of you on the same morning,’ just speaks to me that — hey, this is a guy who is very serious about whatever stands in the way between him and winning, or this program and winning is going to have to just come out of the picture.”

To Dixon, the craziest part of all of this is that Kelly already had enough staff changes on his plate to begin with before he let go of his entire defensive staff. LSU is still searching for an offensive coordinator after Mike Denbrock left for the Notre Dame OC job.

If one thing is for sure — it’s going to be a long offseason in Baton Rouge. But to Kelly, he brought this upon himself for the betterment of his program as college football expands to a 12-team playoff format next season.