On3 Roundtable: Identifying replacements for Maason Smith against Florida State

News broke earlier this week that LSU star defensive tackle Maason Smith would be sidelined for the season opener against Florida State, suspended for making money on autographs shortly before NIL rules went into effect. His absence leaves a massive void in the middle of the LSU defense against a high-powered offense in the opener.

But the Tigers have options to fill in for Smith for the day, even if it’s less-than-optimal to lose one of your best defenders. The Bengal Tiger’s Shea Dixon and On3’s Andy Staples dove into how LSU’s defensive line stacks up against the Seminoles with Smith out in a recent On3 Roundtable.

“There’s two names to keep an eye on right. And I’ll start with Jacobian Guillory. He’s been around LSU’s program a long time. He was a national powerlifting champ in the heavyweight division coming out of high school. Your prototypical nose guard. A guy who can just move people. And they’ve — Matt House’s defense, LSU’s defensive coordinator, he gives a lot of multiple looks. And we’ve seen a lot of Jacobian Guillory working with the first team. So that’s not out of the norm for them and they’ll lean on that a good bit. But the guy who’s been working behind Maason Smith and I think we’ll now see more of in the Florida State game is Jordan Jefferson,” Dixon said, noting it’s a different Jefferson than the former LSU quarterback.

Guillory moved into a big role for the Tigers in 2022 after Smith injured his knee in the opener against Florida State and was out for the season. In 14 games, including two starts, he had 23 total tackles but struggled to make splash plays in the backfield.

Jefferson, a West Virginia transfer, brings a wealth of playing experience, albeit not for LSU. He’s played in 42 games and made 17 starts, including all 12 games in 2022.

Having Jefferson on the roster is a textbook example, to Dixon, of the value of mining the transfer portal for depth and talent.

“But, Andy, this is why you go to the portal. And we had talked about: Look, LSU’s got Saivion Jones who I think is going to have a breakout year as a defensive end. Mekhi Wingo may be one of the best-kept secrets that is in the SEC right now. A guy that was All-SEC at Missouri as a freshman on that team. Came to LSU last year, All-SEC again. Now he’s back for his third season. And then you add Maason Smith and it was like, ‘Oh man, those three guys putting their hand in the dirt is pretty good. And you’ve got depth.’ Well now that depth gets tested. But, the benefit of the portal, they went to West Virginia, got a guy like Jordan Jefferson,” Dixon said.

Staples concurred, noting that Jefferson brings Power 5 experience and shouldn’t be overwhelmed or overpowered by SEC offensive linemen.

“That’s the thing. He comes from a Power 5 league,” Staples said. “It wasn’t like he was playing in the FCS. That is definitely helpful for them.”

Dixon made another point about the suspension, noting LSU has been aware of the issue far longer than the general public.

Smith originally could’ve been suspended for a game in 2022 but his season-ending injury in Week 1 prevented the NCAA from hitting him with the punitive measure. But the LSU coaching staff has been prepping for playing without Smith in Week 1 for sometime now, Dixon said.

“Now, here we are a week out from the game finding out publicly Maason won’t play. But behind closed doors at LSU they’ve obviously known about this for a while and certainly have known about the FSU part about not being available for the opener. Meaning they’ve gone through practices getting other guys ready,” Dixon said.