Just weeks after publicly airing his frustrations, Lane Kiffin is singing a different tune about his quarterbacks. But with his starter still sidelined, the sudden optimism raises more questions than it answers for the Tigers.

“The quarterbacks really had a good week… improvement,” Kiffin said during his press conference on Tuesday. “Again, today, with the lack of turnovers, interception-wise. Two Saturdays ago was not very good, as we know. The whole goal is to come up here to show them, to teach them, and for improvement in it. Those guys played a lot better Saturday, and they practiced better today and on Thursday. That’s been really good because it was concerning.”

The LSU Tigers’ offense has spent most of spring practice putting on displays reminiscent of its offense before Kiffin’s appointment. The Tigers averaged 5.3 yards per play and 22.8 points per game last season.

Unfortunately, the Lisfranc injury of starting quarterback and Arizona State transfer Sam Leavitt only compounded their woes. Leavitt, who was the No. 1 player in the transfer portal, joined LSU with an injury he picked up in his former program, leaving Kiffin with two freshmen in the QB position. Currently, Husan Longstreet and Landen Clark are getting a major chunk of snaps in practice.

With the idea that any complaint about a team’s offense is first directed at the quarterback room, the practices were so worrisome that Kiffin admitted that the team could not approach any opponent with such an offense.

“Like I said, if we would have had to play at that point, we would have to be a defensive team and protect the football and try to win on defense. But again, we’re not playing last week. So that progression is really good. Looking at things, this probably was the way it would go as far as offense being behind defense.”

The progress was always going to come on offense as long as the players got to spend more time practicing together, since the lack of offensive chemistry was the major problem. The 2026 team not only has a new head coach who brought in 11 additional members of the coaching staff, but also has over 40 new entries, most of whom joined the offense.

Furthermore, the team has had to battle with more offensive injuries, “with the receiver and quarterback out,” which makes the initial chaos quite understandable. On the other hand, the team’s defense has had fewer additions and injuries, making it stand out from the offense throughout spring practice. But as things stand, the offense is improving, and Kiffin is “pleased” with what he sees from them.

Lane Kiffin on DC Baker and Tigers’ defense 

The LSU Tigers had Blake Baker as the defensive coordinator in 2025 and were able to keep him for another three years. The extension came after he helped the defense to a 15th-place national ranking in scoring defense, allowing just 18.3 points per game. And even in a new system with Kiffin, Baker is performing at least as well.

“But Blake does a great job. Players play really hard for him. He’s a great motivator, and so I really like that because it creates a competitive atmosphere out there.”

Interestingly, Kiffin has been an admirer of Baker since his days at Ole Miss.

“Playing LSU every year as we did at the previous place, you know, we had to watch the transformation defensively when Blake got here, and how that worked and how much they improved each season. And so, you know, I was very pleased that we were able to keep him.”

Baker remains firm on the program’s defense. And Kiffin has a goal of building the offense to be as productive and excellent as the defense. If he achieves his goal, the SEC will witness a completely new LSU Tigers in 2026.