LSU interim athletic director Verge Ausberry will have full authority to hire the Tigers' next football coach, and he told reporters Friday that a search committee has already been formed to identify Brian Kelly's replacement.
Ausberry, a former LSU linebacker who has been connected to the university for more than 30 years, is now leading the athletics department after former athletics director Scott Woodward and the school mutually agreed to part ways Thursday.
"We're going to hire the best football coach there is," Ausberry said in a news conference Friday in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. "That's our job. We are not going to let this program fail. LSU has to be in the playoffs every year in football. There's 12 teams that make it. It's going to expand here. We have to be one of those teams at LSU. No substitute."
Woodward's departure came a day after Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry told reporters that Woodward wouldn't be involved in hiring Kelly's replacement, saying he'd rather let President Donald Trump do it.
The Tigers fired Kelly on Sunday, a day after they lost to Texas A&M 49-25 at home and dropped to 5-3.
While some have suggested that the political controversy surrounding the LSU athletics department shake-up might scare away some potential candidates, Ausberry was confident the Tigers will find the right coach.
"We're LSU," Ausberry said. "This place is not broken. The athletic department is not broken. We win."
Ausberry, the executive deputy athletic director under Woodward, is a member of the search committee, along with LSU board of supervisors chairman Scott Ballard and other board members and donors.
The board of supervisors is scheduled to select the next LSU president on Tuesday, but Ballard told reporters that wouldn't affect the search for a new football coach.
McNeese State president Wade Rousse, University of Alabama provost James Dalton and former University of Arizona president Robert Robbins are finalists for the school president position.
"We're not slowing down for that," Ballard said. "Verge is going to move forward and knows what he needs to do. But, depending on how that works out and when the new president starts, the new president will absolutely have input and hopefully hit the ground running."
Landry criticized Woodward for agreeing to a 10-year, $95 million contract with Kelly that included incentives and left LSU on the hook for a $54 million buyout under the terms of the deal.
In a statement Monday, Woodward said the school would "continue to negotiate [Kelly's] separation and will work toward a path that is better for both parties."
Landry held a meeting at the governor's mansion Sunday night to discuss the legalities of firing Kelly and who would pay his hefty buyout.
In his news conference at the state capitol in Baton Rouge on Wednesday, Landry suggested that LSU's new football coach would have a merit-based contract that wouldn't include a massive buyout. Ausberry said he was told to find the best coach and not worry about the contract's parameters.
Woodward, who had been LSU's athletics director since 2019, is owed a buyout of more than $6 million, sources told ESPN.
"The governor had a right to be concerned, and we're working towards solutions," board of supervisors member John Carmouche told reporters Friday. "Everything's on the table. But let me make it clear: The state has never, and taxpayers have never, paid for a coach and never will."
More than anything, Ausberry said LSU has to get its football program back on track. He walked the field during the third and fourth quarters of last week's game and saw that Tiger Stadium was half empty.
"It's not a good thing," he said. "[Former Ohio State football coach] Woody Hayes always said the worst word in the dictionary was 'apathy.' This program cannot have apathy, in no way or means. We have to win. We have to be successful."