LSU did not include Dae'Quan Wright and Zxavian Harris, two former Ole Miss players who signed NFL contracts this offseason, on the roster it submitted to the College Sports Commission on Friday. Neither will play in the Tigers' season opener Saturday against Clemson, despite Wright telling reporters on Thursday he expected to. That move comes one day after a Baton Rouge, Louisiana, judge granted a preliminary injunction that allowed for LSU to roster the players.
Interestingly, LSU left two roster spots open on its 105-player roster and could potentially add those players at a later date. They are both enrolled at the school. LSU's decision Friday to leave off the two players came after pressure reached unprecedented levels.
On Monday, CBS Sports reported that the SEC was weighing possible forfeiture of games, a legal challenge in federal court and even possible expulsion if LSU didn't back down from wanting to roster the former NFL players. At the time, expulsion was considered "extremely, extremely unlikely but speaks to the level of frustration within the conference that it has even been uttered." Three days later, the SEC filed a federal lawsuit against head coach Lane Kiffin, athletic director Verge Ausberry, the university and others associated with it. And the frustration of SEC presidents and chancellors continued to ratchet up over the course of the week, according to multiple sources.
What once seemed completely unthinkable -- the SEC expelling LSU -- became slightly more realistic by Friday. Multiple sources believed that if LSU refused to deescalate the situation, the votes were there to expel the institution should that be the path the SEC's leaders decided on. Earlier in the week Georgia attorney general Chris Carr encouraged SEC commissioner Greg Sankey to "take all measures available to address this conduct, up to and including suspending and/or removing LSU from the conference." Of course, no one ever wanted it to get to that point and saying you'd vote to take drastic action and actually doing it are two very different things.
It had already escalated beyond what most thought possible, but the hope was always that eventually LSU would back down. Expulsion was the last-resort nuclear option, but the SEC had multiple punishment tools at its disposal. LSU's roster concession on Friday was thus tantamount to nuclear football disarmment.
The SEC's leaders had granted Sankey full power to punish any school and coach who violates the conference's ban on playing former professional players. The SEC already established penalties that included the head coach being suspended for half the season, a massive fine of up to 50% the program's operating budget and more. Why has the SEC been willing to fight so hard?
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