The call came just as Ed Orgeron was pulling into a Taco Bell drive-thru, and the legendary LSU head coach quickly decided Sai’vion Jones was more important than a taco.
“Coach!” said Robert Valdez, then Jones’ coach at St. James High in Vacherie, La. “I got Sai’vion Jones on the phone.”
“Oh, hell, baby!” Orgeron exclaimed in his unmistakable Cajun drawl.
A few months after LSU had put together one of the most dominant seasons in college football history, the now-ex head coach was trying to win another recruiting race in spring 2020: Jones, a four-star edge rusher who’d sprouted into a top Louisiana prospect.