LSU spring game takeaways: Kyren Lacy continues to impress, QBs look sharp

BATON ROUGE, La. — At the start of spring ball, an LSU staff member was asked who the starting LSU receivers could be. It was almost a rhetorical question. It always seemed set to be returning starters Malik Nabers and Brian Thomas plus exciting Alabama transfer Aaron Anderson. The coach agreed that was the most likely trio.

But then he had a follow-up.

“Don’t forget Kyren Lacy, though.”

Two months later, the LSU spring game began with quarterback Jayden Daniels heaving the ball down the middle of the field with Lacy — the senior receiver who transferred from Louisiana last year — leaping into the air and making an almost Odell Beckham-esque one-handed catch to bring it in.

And then he kept going. He caught it near the 45-yard line and took off. Three LSU defenders caught him, including star linebacker Harold Perkins, but Lacy shook all three off and coasted into the end zone for a 70-yard score.

Oh man. There goes @alltimegreattt with @mspears96 watching on the field. pic.twitter.com/YpaddbSNCd

— LSU Football (@LSUfootball) April 22, 2023

Maybe no LSU player has elevated his stock this spring more than Lacy, the Thibodaux, La., native from down in the bayou who has impressed LSU coaches the last two months while Anderson has been out with a knee injury. On Saturday, he caught four passes for 92 yards and showed he could be a shifty, athletic option who could work as a nice counter to Nabers and Thomas.

Maybe Lacy hasn’t gone as far as earning the third starting spot, but he’s put himself in the conversation to be an impact player this fall.

“I think at times he was trying to find himself relative to where he fit,” coach Brian Kelly said, “and I think he’s comfortable with where he is in our rotation now.”

Here are thoughts from LSU’s spring game.

• Both quarterbacks looked sharp for the most part. Daniels opened a red zone drill with a perfect tight fade to Nabers in the right corner. He went 10-of-11 for 168 yards, hitting Nabers and Thomas across the middle of the field a few times in tight spots. Obviously, nobody should take too much from the spring game, but decisiveness is always the key with him, and he looked quick in his decision-making.

• Redshirt sophomore Garrett Nussmeier also looked better than even the stats might show, going 5-of-8 for 139 yards. Most of his reps were with the second-team offense, meaning he was playing with multiple walk-on offensive linemen against a good defensive front. Then, he got thrown in with the first-team offense, and his first play was a 51-yard bomb to Thomas down the right side. He finished up with a line-drive touchdown to Thomas on a slant. Nussmeier remains an exciting watch.

• Four months ago, inside linebacker seemed like a concern. Suddenly, LSU’s front seven looks like it has a chance to be one of the best in the country. Keep in mind the Tigers went the whole spring without their two star defensive tackles, Maason Smith and Mekhi Wingo, yet Jacobian Guillory is a really good nose tackle. Edge rusher Ovie Oghoufo,  a Texas transfer, looks great (more on him in a moment), and now with Perkins, Oregon State transfer Omar Speights and returning starter Greg Penn, LSU has a potentially dominant trio. Speights looked great, showing his sideline-to-sideline speed on two solo tackles in the flat. As for Perkins …

• Perkins has a chance to be special at inside linebacker. Many were concerned about moving him from the outside, where he thrived last fall, but Saturday’s spring game was evidence of the upside. On one run play near the goal line, he slithered through the tiniest of gaps in the line and wrapped up Noah Cain for a tackle for loss. It’s absurd how quick his acceleration is. And there was a first-half sack in which Paris Shand sped around the edge and Perkins stunted up the middle and blew up the running back blockers to drive the line back and set up a sack.

• It was also interesting to see how Perkins and Speights complemented each other. Sometimes Perkins would line up as the lone true inside linebacker and Speights would be off covering the slot receiver, something Speights had experience doing at Oregon State. Sometimes a receiver would motion to the other side and Speights would slide inside and Perkins would go out wide on the motion side. Again, I’m not pretending there are scheme things we can take from a spring game, but it did make me think these two nimble athletes might be able to take on free-flowing roles to keep this defense malleable.

• For whatever reason, the Oghoufo signing from Texas was met with an underwhelming response this winter. Maybe it felt like a journeyman, middle-of-the road veteran Power 5 starter replacing a star in BJ Ojulari on the edge. Now that spring is over, it might be time to acknowledge Oghoufo is really good. He had an early sack in the red zone period, beating All-SEC tackle Will Campbell off the edge. He had a tackle for loss from the backside on a handoff. He’s really athletic, but it will be interesting to see how he does physically against SEC offensive lines. The LSU training staff thinks highly of him. For what it’s worth, Oregon transfer edge Bradyn Swinson also had a sack off the edge around Emery Jones and created good pressure inside and outside.

• In terms of concerns, LSU’s kicking game remains a question mark. Both returning starter Damian Ramos and sophomore Nathan Dibert missed field goals of 40-plus yards. That comes after Ramos went 10-of-14 last season. Ramos was solid in some tough moments last year, but this spot remains an area that feels shaky. “We have to keep an open mind on it, and we have to keep them competing,” Kelly said.

• It’s difficult to take much from the LSU corners Saturday. They held their own for the most part. First-team nickel Sage Ryan missed multiple tackles, but he also had two nice breakups. Zy Alexander and JK Johnson earned the starts on the outside while highly acclaimed Texas A&M transfer Denver Harris rotated in and played with the second team. I wouldn’t say any of them did anything special, but nobody got beat in a notable way. Maybe we’ll learn more on second watch. Sophomore Laterrance Welch worked with the second team, and he actually stood out with multiple tough pass breakups.

• I remain super impressed with true freshman defensive back Javien Toviano. The 6-foot-1, 199-pound corner looks so physical for a first-year defensive back, and he opened the game with a big hit on a running back in the flat. He then broke up a nice pass to Lacy on a wheel route that would have been easy to get lost on. LSU has Toviano primarily playing nickel-safety this spring, but Kelly said he’s also getting work at corner. It feels safe to say he’s going to play a lot this fall one way or another, and I wouldn’t be shocked if he takes the starting nickel spot from Ryan down the road.

• On lighter notes, after Nussmeier threw the touchdown to Thomas, Daniels sprinted out onto the field and hopped into a dance with Thomas to celebrate. It seems like a lot of guys like Daniels, and Daniels and Nussmeier often engage with each other and talk after plays.

LSU rolled out the red carpet today for 5-star EDGE Colin Simmons🔥

Joe Burrow, Angel Reese, and Jamar Chase were among the many LSU legends in attendance.

The Tigers are currently trending to land Simmons per the On3 Recruiting Prediction Machine👀https://t.co/a7D0auTSwq pic.twitter.com/XxPqTUI64J

— On3 (@On3sports) April 22, 2023

• This is always a big recruiting week, and LSU brought in Joe Burrow, Ja’Marr Chase and Angel Reese to give it a boost. They took photos with some of the top players in the country, most notably five-star defensive lineman Colin Simmons.

(Photo of Kyren Lacey in the Citrus Bowl: Matt Pendleton / USA Today)