Leavitt’s off the sheet. Kick is tonight. Oxford is already loud.
No. 7 LSU at No. 8 Ole Miss — Magnolia Bowl, ABC, GameDay in The Grove, and the quarterback saga just ended with a blank line.
By Rhett Landry
Friday night the SEC availability report did the only thing that mattered for Saturday: Sam Leavitt’s name was gone. Field Level Media, ESPN, and CBS all had it. Doubtful Wednesday. Questionable Thursday. Cleared Friday. Under league language, that means he is expected to play when No. 7 LSU walks into Vaught-Hemingway against No. 8 Ole Miss tonight — 6:30 p.m. CT on ABC, Stripe Out, College GameDay already camping in The Grove since morning.
Argue the gamesmanship later. Oxford staff spent midweek telling ESPN they did not buy the original doubtful tag. Kiffin never put an injury on the Monday podium or the Thursday radio show. Fine. Tonight the ball still snaps, and the dual-threat Arizona State transfer who has started both games — 574 passing yards, two through the air, five on the ground through two weeks — is back on the depth chart without a designation. T.J. Dottery, the leading tackler, stays questionable. That is the only leftover scar on the sheet that still matters.
Everything else was already written in mustard and state-police overtime. First top-10 LSU-Ole Miss meeting since 1962. Kiffin's first walk back into the building he left before Ole Miss's playoff run. Pete Golding on the home sideline. Trinidad Chambliss and Kewan Lacy - the backfield Kiffin himself called two Heisman names in the same offense - against a purple defense that has been as stingy as any in the country through Clemson and Tech. Home has won the last six in the series. Purple has not left Oxford with a win since the 2019 title year. Morgan Freeman is the GameDay guest picker. Mounted cops are in from Alabama. The lawsuit papers already hit the parking lot earlier in the week. None of that needs a refresher.
Kiffin's Monday line still hangs over the bus: the hatred is on him, the pressure is on them, purple just gets to play. Oxford will try to make that a lie for three hours. Chambliss does not give the ball away. Lacy hits downhill. Golding knows Kiffin's offense from three years of practice tape. Blake Baker's defense has not faced a backfield like this yet. If Leavitt is truly clean, purple has its engine. If the week's drama was theater, the Grove will still boo the headset either way.
Kick is tonight. The sheet is quiet. The town is not. Bring the Magnolia Bowl back to Baton Rouge - or spend Sunday explaining Oxford again.
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