Two losses usually leave a team with less room for error in the national title race. But ESPN’s Rece Davis believes LSU can win it all if it gets in. After watching the Tigers beat Auburn on the road, he picked them as a dangerous underdog. The catch is that LSU still has to get there, and the next two games are the biggest hurdle.

“I think LSU is the team. Now, they have some tests,” said ESPN’s Rece Davis on Tuesday’s episode of The Pat McAfee Show. “They’ve got Alabama, they’ve got Texas, but if they get there, I’d watch out because they’re certainly capable of winning the whole thing. I think if they get in, they can do it.”

Davis made his case with a comparison. He said he is not looking for a team like Indiana in 2024, which was strong in the regular season, but for one like Miami last year, which entered the playoffs as the No. 10 seed and made a deep run to the national championship game. In his view, LSU is the team that fits that mold.

LSU lost at Kentucky on a two-point conversion at the end, 35-34 OT, and it dropped a wild game early at Ole Miss, 32-24. Those two results are why the Tigers are 6-2 and ranked No. 15 in the AP poll instead of unbeaten. 

Davis’s main reason is quarterback Sam Leavitt, and he believes that over the last couple of games it feels like Leavitt is getting comfortable and taking better care of the football. 

LSU beat Mississippi State 31-0, with Leavitt throwing for 289 yards and four touchdowns. Then LSU beat Auburn 38-17, with Leavitt completing 32 of 45 passes for 387 yards and three touchdowns. He added 54 rushing yards and another score. Across the two games, he has 676 passing yards, seven touchdown passes and no interceptions.

The Auburn game was LSU’s best half of football since head coach Lane Kiffin arrived. The Tigers scored on five of their six first-half possessions and led 31-10 at the break. The win also snapped an eight-game road losing streak in SEC play. Jackson Harris caught nine passes for 178 yards, including a 12-yard crossing route that went for 70. 

“We saw his speed and outran everybody in the SEC to get his play today,” Kiffin said in the postgame presser. 

Tight end Trey’Dez Green came back from a sprained knee after missing four games and caught five passes for 50 yards and a touchdown.

Auburn coach Alex Golesh was direct about his own team, saying, “We’ve had the high of highs, and that was the low of lows.”

During Tuesday’s show, McAfee agreed with Davis’s read on Leavitt. 

“Sam Leavitt, to your point, hasn’t had anywhere near the number of turnovers he was having there for a while, because I think he was overthinking and didn’t really know what was going on,” McAfee said. He also pointed to the defense. 

In his view, LSU is “bigger, stronger, faster than you on the other side of the ball.” McAfee also liked the story that would come with a deep run. 

“Lane Kiffin in the College Football Playoff as an underdog, kind of a late seed, I think that would be an incredible story for the CFP,” he said, and added a warning. “A lot has to happen, with more teams coming out of the Big 12 as well.”

The schedule is where Davis’s “if” gets serious. LSU has a bye, then hosts Alabama on Saturday, Nov. 7, at Tiger Stadium. Texas follows on Nov. 14, also in Baton Rouge. After those two, the Tigers still have to deal with Tennessee and Arkansas. 

That is why Davis’s pick is conditional, but per him, the Tigers are built to be dangerous, and the evidence for that is Leavitt’s recent play.