Indiana head coach and reigning national champion Curt Cignetti has Google in his corner. Apparently, LSU football coach Lane Kiffin relies on ChatGPT.
According to Kiffin’s friend, who is also one of the nation’s most prominent sports lawyers, the LSU football coach turned to ChatGPT for legal advice at a critical moment for the university.
“Usually, when I would express an opinion about what LSU was doing, Lane would reply with a screenshot from ChatGPT that supported LSU’s position, which was almost always wrong,” Attorney Tom Mars told ESPN.
Despite incurring the wrath of rivals, the Southeastern Conference (SEC), the NCAA, and many, many talking heads, LSU initially fought to add former NFL players Dae’Quan Wright and Zxavian Harris to Kiffin’s inaugural squad. In November, LSU announced that it had hired Kiffin away from the Ole Miss Rebels, a fellow SEC member, with a seven-year, $91 million deal that came in the middle of the Rebels’ College Football Playoff run. Both Wright and Harris played under Kiffin at Ole Miss, and both signed with NFL teams after going undrafted.
The situation escalated to the point that the SEC, of which LSU is a founding member, went to court to secure a ruling allowing conference leaders representing the other members to meet and consider LSU’s status. If LSU were kicked out of the SEC, the university would likely lose out on lucrative conference TV rights payments.
With university presidents, state attorneys general, governors, and even members of Congress involved, LSU was facing an unprecedented fight over its very future.
Mars said that he told his friend the stakes were too high to rely on an AI chatbot.
“Eventually I told him that a guy with a $91 million contract ought to have a top-notch lawyer on speed dial and not be using ChatGPT for legal advice,” he said.
Representatives for Kiffin, Mars, and OpenAI did not respond to a request for comment. LSU declined to comment.
While Wright and Harris prevailed in state court, LSU ultimately backed down and announced a final 2026 roster that did not include either player.
Mars said Kiffin reached out to him, which means the LSU coach, known for not doing things by the book, followed OpenAI‘s terms for this area. The ChatGPT maker, like its competitors, makes it clear that users should not rely on an AI chatbot as the sole source of professional advice. Specifically, it says ChatGPT is not “a substitute for professional advice.”
It remains an unsettled area of law what happens if a user follows the chatbot’s advice and suffers harm.
In a federal court case in Illinois, OpenAI has argued that ChatGPT is not a lawyer and does not practice law in response to a $10.3 million suit filed by a life insurance company. Nippon Life Insurance Company has argued that OpenAI is to blame for ChatGPT giving inaccurate legal advice to a former disability claimant who, relying on ChatGPT, breached a settlement agreement with the insurance company.
As for Kiffin, Mars said it’s unlikely the LSU coach will rely on ChatGPT for legal advice again.
“Lane ignored most of my unsolicited advice, but I don’t think he’ll be using ChatGPT anymore for legal advice,” he said.
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