Lane Kiffin's early excuse-making at LSU proves Curt Cignetti is the real Portal King

Curt Cignetti has turned the college football world on its head over his two seasons in Bloomington. Cignetti took over the program with the most losses in college football history and instantly turned it into a powerhouse.

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Part of Cignetti's success has come from his masterful use of the transfer portal. New LSU head coach Lane Kiffin is the proclaimed "Portal King," but that title may now belong to Cignetti.

Curt Cignetti has used the transfer portal masterfully

Cignetti has prioritized bringing in experienced and talented but perhaps under-the-radar transfers to bolster IU's roster. His plan has worked perfectly.

Last season, Cignetti brought in a transfer portal class ranked No. 25 in the country by 247Sports. Led by Heisman Trophy-winning QB Fernando Mendoza, IU orchestrated a perfect 16-0 season that culminated in a historic national title.

In two years at Indiana, Cignetti has used the portal to lead the Hoosiers to an overall record of 27-2 with two College Football Playoff appearances, a Big Ten Championship, and wins in the Rose Bowl, Peach Bowl, and CFP National Championship Game. Not too shabby.

Cignetti's instant success at Indiana has put pressure on other coaches to win immediately. Many coaches taking over at a new job try to preach the importance of having patience when building a program, but in today's world of NIL and the portal, Cignetti showed that it doesn't need to take much time at all.

Lane Kiffin's comments about patience make Curt Cignetti look even better

As he enters Year 1 of his tenure in Baton Rouge, Kiffin is already preaching patience. At a press conference earlier this week, Kiffin said he understands the want for instant success, but that it takes time to build a program to an elite level.

"Things don't happen overnight. It takes a lot of work to get a program up to an elite performing program level. So we're making some first steps but there's a ton of work to do...It was 7-6 last season. So within that comes change, and within that comes a lot of work because that's a long jump to go to the level that I came here to get at."

Lane Kiffin

Kiffin is walking into a situation that has seemingly unlimited resources at LSU, and has signed the No. 1 transfer portal class in the country for the upcoming season. His inaugural LSU portal class includes three of the top-eight portal players according to On3's transfer portal player rankings: QB Sam Leavitt, OT Jordan Seaton, and EDGE Princewill Umanmielen.

Kiffin is taking over an LSU program that went 7-6 last season and went 25-13 over the last three seasons. Cignetti took over an IU program that was 9-27 overall and had just three conference wins in the three seasons before he took over. Cignetti then orchestrated the greatest turnaround in college football history.

Kiffin has everything he needs to have immediate success in Baton Rouge, but he continues to preach patience. Compare his comments with Cignetti's "I win, Google me" quote from his introductory press conference, and the two coaches preached very different messages leading up to their first seasons at their respective jobs.