Leaders of the Southeastern Conference will meet Thursday to discuss whether to take the extraordinary step of kicking LSU out of the league in the wake of an ugly feud over first-year coach Lane Kiffin\u2019s effort to field several players who signed contracts with NFL teams as undrafted rookies last spring.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, the SEC amended the federal lawsuit it filed against LSU last week<\/a>, asking the judge to issue a temporary restraining order to prevent the school from taking action to block or interfere with a scheduled meeting Thursday of SEC member university presidents and chancellors.<\/p>\n A vote of at least two-thirds of the conference\u2019s top leaders would be needed to dump LSU, which was a founding member of the nearly century-old conference in 1933. LSU has a host of powerhouse athletics programs and has won three of the SEC\u2019s 25 AP national championships in football.<\/p>\n A declaration that Commissioner Greg Sankey included with the league\u2019s legal filing made the planned meeting sound like more than posturing; Sankey noted that school presidents met to discuss LSU last Friday, a day after a marathon court hearing<\/a> in which Sankey took the stand to insist the league has the right to enforce its own rules.<\/p>\n \u201cThe consensus … was and continues to be that LSU\u2019s continued membership in the conference would be inconsistent with the publicly stated values and principles of the conference and its remaining member institutions,\u201d even if LSU doesn\u2019t put the former NFL players on its roster, the comissioner said. <\/p>\n An LSU spokesman declined immediate comment.<\/p>\n The SEC has a long-established rule forbidding teams from bringing players with major professional experience onto their rosters. In recent weeks, the conference announced updated enforcement provisions to that rule, stating that the commissioner had the power to suspend coaches, fine universities up to half of a sport\u2019s budget and restrict a member university\u2019s voting privileges on conference matters. <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \n Sign up for Top 25 Poll Alerts: But last Thursday night, a judge in Baton Rouge barred the league<\/a> from enforcing any rules regarding former pros \u2014 a decision celebrated heartily by Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry and the state attorney general, Liz Murrill, who\u2019d filed a brief in the case on behalf of the athletes. <\/p>\n Murrill called the SEC\u2019s lawsuit \u201clegal garbage\u201d shortly after it was filed last week. Now the SEC is listing Murrill as a defendant in its federal lawsuit.<\/p>\n Two of the players, Zxavian Harris and Dae\u2019Quan Wright, have been participating in team activities, but were not placed on the roster in advance of last Saturday\u2019s 51-10, season-opening victory over Clemson<\/a>.<\/p>\n They still could be added, and Sankey made note of two roster spots that LSU has left open for that possibility.<\/p>\n In a statement, the SEC said it has the right to establish rules, stressing that \u201ca commitment to those rules and to the core principles of the Southeastern Conference is an essential element of SEC membership.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cToday\u2019s filing is necessary to defend that right and preserve the Conference\u2019s ability to govern competition among its members,\u201d the statement said. <\/p>\n Sankey took it a step further, saying in his declaration that SEC presidents were concerned LSU\u2019s president, Wade Rousse, and athletic director Verge Ausberry had no \u201cmeaningful control\u201d over Kiffin or the football program.<\/p>\n \u201cIn light of the recalcitrance, lack of institutional control, and serious harm caused by the statements and conduct of LSU,\u201d the school presidents, other than Rousse, called for the meeting, Sankey said. \u201cLack of institutional control\u201d is a phrase often used by the NCAA for the most serious infractions by its membership.<\/p>\n Sankey said the meeting was to consider kicking out LSU, \u201cwhether LSU renounces its intention to roster and play professional players on its football team, or not.\u201d<\/p>\n Kiffin\u2019s hiring was one of two notable coaching changes at LSU involving the highest revenue-generating college sports: football and men\u2019s basketball.<\/p>\n LSU also has brought back Will Wade to coach men\u2019s basketball. Wade was fired by previous athletic director Scott Woodward in the wake of an NCAA investigation into improper inducement payments to recruits when such payments were forbidden.<\/p>\n Wade served a suspension from coaching in college before returning in the 2023-24 with McNeese State. He spent two seasons with the Cowboys and one with North Carolina State before he was brought back to LSU \u2014 a move favored by Landry, as well as Rousse, a Landry ally who was McNeese\u2019s president when Wade was there.<\/p>\n Wade has sought to sign RJ Luis Jr., a former Big East player of the year with St. John\u2019s who spent parts of the 2025 NBA offseason and preseason with the Utah Jazz and Boston Celtics, but never played in a regular season NBA game.<\/p>\n Luis also has been fighting the NCAA in court in Baton Rouge, where a judge on Aug. 24 issued a preliminary injunction that temporarily blocks the NCAA from punishing LSU if the Tigers play Luis \u2014 something that also would violate the SEC rules at the center of the league\u2019s federal lawsuit against LSU.<\/p>\n ___<\/p>\n AP Sports Writer Brett Martel contributed from New Orleans and Baton Rouge. <\/p>\n ___<\/p>\n Sign up for Top 25 poll alerts here<\/a>, visit the Top 25 here<\/a> and see AP\u2019s full college football coverage here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Leaders of the Southeastern Conference will meet Thursday to discuss whether to take the extraordinary step of kicking…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":995580,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2026],"tags":[6030,331,339,100885,7,565,20771,70348,5556,1564,5553,130613,981,54518,1983,58738,5063,9,573,126963,114954,45435],"class_list":["post-995579","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-basketball","tag-college-football","tag-college-sports","tag-daequan-wright","tag-football","tag-general-news","tag-greg-sankey","tag-jeff-landry","tag-la-state-wire","tag-lane-kiffin","tag-lawsuits","tag-liz-murrill","tag-louisiana","tag-louisiana-state-tigers","tag-louisiana-state-tigers-football","tag-scott-woodward","tag-southeastern-conference","tag-sports","tag-u-s-news","tag-wade-rousse","tag-will-wade","tag-zxavian-harris"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/117238015141884522","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/995579","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=995579"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/995579\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/995580"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=995579"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=995579"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=995579"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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