Dave Portnoy Would Rather Coach At LSU Than Florida For All The Wrong Reasons

The LSU Tigers and Florida Gators have dominated the news cycle of college football over the past week, and it's pretty obvious why.

Each team believes they are in a great position to land current Ole Miss head coach, Lane Kiffin, and whether that's true or not has been the topic of discussion all throughout the world of college football.

Part of trying to discern where Kiffin will end up is figuring out which job is more attractive, and everyone has an opinion on the matter.

Barstool Sports founder, Dave Portnoy, was on FOX's Big Noon Kickoff earlier today and was asked to weigh in on where he would rather coach if he were in Kiffin's shoes.

So you can live in the state of Florida, but you can't coach the flagship university of the state, Dave?

Got it.

I don't see you buying any vacation homes in southern Louisiana anytime soon.

In all seriousness, I have to take exception to how he presented his argument.

If you pick LSU or Florida for whatever personal reason, I can't fault you.

But saying that LSU's fans are more into it or that it has a better recruiting footprint are both patently false statements.

LSU has great fans and a phenomenal in-state recruiting advantage, but to act like the University of Florida is lacking in either is insanity.

Let's start with the fans.

I'm going to show you two fanbases, and you tell me which one is more "into it." 

These respective posts are each from the game before the Gators and Tigers relieved their former head coaches of their duties.

Florida has a 16-game home sellout streak, and if you're good at math, you'll see that comes smack-dab in the middle of Billy Napier's woeful tenure in Gainesville.

The video of Death Valley clearing out against Texas A&M isn't entirely fair, but my point is that any fanbase can be excused for bailing when the chips are down.

LSU isn't some special fanbase that's immune to apathy when things aren't going well. However, Gator fans were still showing up to support a head coach who was two games below .500.

Don't talk about fan support when the receipts are so easy to pull.

And recruiting? Please.

According to 247Sports, there are four top-100 prospects in the state of Louisiana for the 2026 recruiting cycle.

The state of Florida has 14 top-100 prospects.

Florida has 57 four-star prospects while Louisiana only has 15.

The talent gulf is laughable, and while you have less recruiting competition in Louisiana, there is still way more meat on the bone in the Sunshine State for a coach to get his fill of high-end recruits.

I talked earlier about the seeming media bias and slant towards LSU, and this is more of the same from Portnoy.

Whether you think LSU or Florida is a better job is highly subjective, but it's not a cut and dry answer like many in the media would lead you to believe.

And the sooner we can start dispensing with these falsehoods, the better.