THIBODAUX, La. (WGNO) — More than 650 high school linemen participated in the 35th annual Louisiana Line Camp at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux on Monday. Former LSU defensive line coach and camp founder Pete Jenkins spoke with WGNO.
Jenkins said while colleges have recruiting camps nowadays, “This is a camp that could care less if you’re a no star or a 5-star. We don’t recruit here, it’s all about helping kids with fundamentals of the game.”
Jenkins has been revered as the greatest defensive line coach in the sport of football, having coached the Philadelphia Eagles, Auburn, Southern miss, Oklahoma State, and LSU in a 45-year period.
With the SEC transitioning to a one-year schedule in 2024 requiring every team to play 8 conference games, Coach Jenkins said not to worry.
“It’s just one year,” he said. “If it’s more than a year, you need to really pay attention to it.”
LSU legend and Pro Football Hall of Famer Kevin Mawae offered another perspective.
“I think if they just did it like the NFL does on a normal rotation basis, everybody will play somebody within. Missouri’s been in the conference for how many years now. LSU’s not played them. Trying to expand the conferences in next couple of years. It’s just going to make it more difficult. I think is just to break it up into divisions like the NFL does it. It makes scheduling a little bit easier and everybody will play each other instead of one-offs. So you know that you won’t see a guy at a team for another five, six, seven years, I think that’s just kind of crazy.”
Mawae is taking over his first year as the head football coach at Lipscomb Academy in Nashville, Tennessee. He was inducted into the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame, LSU Athletic Hall of Fame in 2007, and the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2019.
The Louisiana Line Camp started in 1987 with Jessie Daigle, Kenny Ferro, and Pete Jenkins and continues with people like Mawae and other high school, college, and NFL coaches.
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