HANAGRIFF: Stagnant Saints, troubling basketball and a hopeful Super Bowl week

By Charles Hanagriff

It’s as good a time as any to empty the notebook.  Some of these topics are a touch bleak for a full column anyway. The Saints are moving slowly. The basketball in state is stale, and the eyes of the country focus on New Orleans next week.

When Dat?

The Saints search for a head coach continues, and the natural reaction is that finding takers for the position hasn’t been easy. It is not necessary to be on a fast track, as it is in college football, because there isn’t a recruiting calendar or a transfer portal. 

But there is an internal clock. The Senior Bowl is this week. The combine is less than a month away. Coveted assistants are taking jobs around the league where all of the vacancies except the one in New Orleans have been filled. 

If the Saints have indeed been waiting on an assistant off of one of the Super Bowl staffs, like Kellen Moore, and they make the hire quickly after the game, then so be it.   

But if this process is taking this long because of another reason, it’s cause for additional concern…for a team with enough concerns as it is. 

Respected NFL reporter Josina Anderson posted this on Tuesday: 

A league source tells me some of the questions surrounding Mike McCarthy and the #Saints head coach vacancy (ever since he became a free agent) have involved sentiments over the power structure & communication when it comes to football decisions, length of contract, etc.–similar…

— JosinaAnderson (@JosinaAnderson) January 28, 2025

Not exactly inspiring, or surprising, for Saints fans.   

Basketball Blues

The LSU men’s basketball team is 12-8, 1-6 in SEC play a third of the way through conference play. The Tigers have played hard for the most part, but their roster is not built to be top level competitive in the league. 

LSU does not have a Quadrant 1 win to their credit this season. Their best wins are against a six-loss UCF team at a neutral site, and a 12-8 Arkansas team at home. 

If the Tigers, who will likely finish with somewhere around three or four SEC wins, want to elevate the program, they are going to have to do what the baseball and women’s basketball teams figured out three years ago, and the football team finally came around to this year. 

You have to use the portal. 

If LSU is going to get serious about competing in what has become a juggernaut conference, they have to get serious about the portal. That means, in a word, money. 

Hate the system if you want, and I am no huge fan of it, but it’s how the game is played now. LSU’s six conference losses are by an average of double digits.  Their two other non-Q4 wins are against Kansas State and Florida State, both having down years. 

Quick turnarounds at Missouri and Vanderbilt, both of whom beat the Tigers earlier this year, are proof that it can be done. But the passive approach LSU is taking is not going to work. 

 Bye Bye, Brandon?

The NBA trade deadline is February 6.  The New Orleans Pelicans have two key issues– the expiring contract of Brandon Ingram and the luxury tax, which they are currently 1.4m above. 

The Pels currently have the third worst record in the NBA and obviously will not make the playoffs, so paying the tax is a non-starter.  They’ll make a move one way or the other to get under that number. 

Whether it will involve Ingram is a more complicated question.  New Orleans could trade Daniel Theis, Javonte Green, Jeremiah Robinson-Earl, or a combination of those, and get under the tax without moving Ingram. 

That would mean that without an extension (unlikely), Ingram could leave for nothing this summer. However, many of the contending teams that could “rent” Ingram for the rest of the season are in an apron that restricts what they can send back. A trade can still be done, but the return is probably not going to be all that exciting.  

Further complicating things is the small matter of Ingram actually returning to the floor.  He has not played since December 8 because of an ankle injury. 

There is not a ton of cap space out there this summer.  Maybe this could all work out in July, but if the Pelicans couldn’t sign him when they were the only team bidding, count me as dubious. 

There is more talent than the record indicates in New Orleans.  If they could ever get them all on the court at the same time it would be interesting to watch.  For now, though, Pelicans fans have two dates to consider– the trade deadline and the lottery. 

Super Week

The Super Bowl returns to New Orleans for the 11th time next week.  The city has quite a history with the championship game. It was the sight of Joe Montana’s last, Tom Brady’s first and Brett Favre’s only Super Bowl win. 

It also featured the first championships for legendary coaches Hank Stram, Tom Landry, Chuck Noll and Bill Belichick. 

New Orleans was the site of both of Hall of Fame quarterback Roger Staubach’s Super Bowl wins and the first of two for Raiders coach Tom Flores. 

The Big Easy featured the only Super Bowl win for the Chicago Bears, 1985.  That was probably the best defense in NFL history, and it marked the only championship for head coach Mike Ditka, who would not enjoy anywhere near that same success when the Superdome became his home stadium. 

It’s where Desmond Howard won his MVP, Ray Lewis played his last game, and Oakland’s Rod Martin intercepted three passes, still a Super Bowl record 44 years later. 

Super Bowl XV was played as the hostages were returning from Iran. A huge yellow ribbon adorned the Superdome that day, and it was the first Super Bowl I personally attended. My father took me, age 9, and I’ll absolutely never forget it, for many reasons. 

Super Bowl XXXVI was the first one played after 9/11, and maybe it was fitting that the Patriots won.  The city proved that day that they could host the game in the light of significant security concerns. We pray with confidence that it will be up to that task again this time. 

Only two of the previous 10 games in New Orleans were decided by less than 10 points, but they were the last two, so hopefully that streak will continue. 

And in a place dripping with Super Bowl superlatives, it would be fitting if the only three-peat in NFL history came in the Crescent City.