LSU football's Brian Kelly is having a Will Smith moment. Now what? | Toppmeyer

If you’re a member of Elon Musk’s time-sucking social media app, you’ve probably seen the popular GIF from “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” that shows Will Smith standing in the Banks family living room after everyone had moved out.

I thought of that scene this week amid LSU’s mass turnover.

Like Smith’s character in that series finale, LSU’s Brian Kelly finds himself at a crossroads as he enters Year 3 in Baton Rouge.

This will be the most important offseason of his LSU tenure.

Kelly must reload the offense as Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Jayden Daniels and star wide receivers Malik Nabers and Brian Thomas Jr. head to the NFL.

Further, Kelly needs new coordinators and a fresh direction on defense, which stunk this season — and that's putting it mildly. He cleaned house Wednesday by firing all but two of his defensive assistants.

His defensive coordinator hire will be his most important move since he brought in Daniels as a transfer before his first season. An LSU program that once was known for having the nation’s fiercest defense never should be as porous and apathetic as it was on that side of the ball this season.

Missouri defensive coordinator Blake Baker is a prime candidate, 247Sports reported Wednesday. He’s well-qualified, and the Tigers fielded one of the SEC’s best defenses this season. Baker indicated earlier this winter that he wasn’t leaving Missouri, but I trust a coach’s pledge of allegiance like I trust an email that says a Nigerian prince requires my financial help.

Money and opportunities talk.

Baker is from Houston, he played at Tulane and he previously was an LSU assistant.

Check, check, check.

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If Baker isn’t the hire, then Kelly should apply a full-court press for Jim Leonhard. Just a couple of years ago, Leonhard was one of the hottest defensive coordinators in the country at Wisconsin. He parted with UW after the Badgers hired Luke Fickell as coach and became an Illinois analyst. It’s a matter of time before Leonhard re-enters the coordinator ring.

Florida State coordinator Adam Fuller also should look attractive, although he has been tied at the hip with coach Mike Norvell for several seasons.

Kelly must multitask, because he also has an important offensive coordinator hire after Mike Denbrock returned to Notre Dame.

Kelly told me before this season that 2024 was a realistic timeline to expect LSU to seriously contend for a national championship. Even if he had left the timeline unsaid, a school with LSU’s expectations that hired a coach of Kelly’s pedigree and salary will desire progress toward a national title in his third season.

Kelly must make multiple good hires for that to happen, and he needs some instant-impact transfer talent. Simply put, the team that beat Wisconsin 35-31 in the ReliaQuest Bowl doesn’t profile as a 2024 championship contender.

Garrett Nussmeier won’t duplicate Daniels’ season, but he nonetheless seems ready for the quarterback reins. He threw for 395 yards and three touchdowns in that bowl victory. It’s everything else that I’d worry about.

To this point, the Kelly-LSU union has gone fairly well. Although he hasn’t lifted LSU back to the College Football Playoff, he won 20 games through two seasons and brought in and developed a Heisman-winning quarterback.

I’d describe Kelly’s first season, when the Tigers won the SEC West, as a bit of an overachievement. The encore ranks as a bit of an underachievement. LSU had an offense good enough to win a national championship this season but couldn’t get its defense righted.

Still, 20 wins is two more than Nick Saban had after his first two LSU seasons.

Saban’s LSU tenure became marked by what came next. So will Kelly’s. He has history with a fork-in-the-road moment like this. After Notre Dame went 4-8 in 2016, he rebooted with new coordinators, plus a new starting quarterback. The Irish reignited.

In that “Fresh Prince” finale I referenced, Smith takes stock of what he considers a relative lack of achievement while his family members move in new directions and toward exciting opportunities.

With so many moving on from LSU, from talented players to failed assistant coaches, this a chance for Kelly to assess needs, evaluate weaknesses and redirect the program toward a future beyond 10-win seasons.

How he handles this moment will define his LSU tenure.

Blake Toppmeyer is the USA TODAY Network's SEC Columnist. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter @btoppmeyer.

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