Most people return to their old college hoping to spot a familiar face, grab something good to eat and remember where they parked.
Shaquille O’Neal apparently gets the celebrity ensemble edition.
The Big Fella returned to Baton Rouge on Saturday, November 7, joining LSU’s traditional Tiger Walk before the Tigers hosted Alabama. Alongside coach Lane Kiffin were Shaq, Angel Reese, Paul Skenes and—because this guest list evidently needed an Oscar winner—Kevin Costner.
Former LSU gymnast Livvy Dunne was also back for the occasion.
That is a fairly impressive collection of people to encounter on your way to a football game. Somewhere, an ordinary alumni group photo just developed an inferiority complex.
The Tiger Walk takes the team down Victory Hill toward Tiger Stadium, giving supporters a chance to welcome the players before kickoff. This time, fans also got a procession packed with recognizable faces from basketball, baseball, gymnastics and Hollywood.
SportsCenter captured the mood by comparing the group to the Avengers.
Fair comparison. Although if somebody needs to carry the entire team bus, we know which member of this particular ensemble is getting the call.
For Shaq, the visit was another chance to show up where his basketball story took shape. Before the NBA championships, the television desk and the seemingly endless list of business ventures, there was LSU.
Seeing him back among the purple and gold has an appeal that never really wears off. He can be famous practically everywhere and still be one of the familiar faces coming home.
Granted, most familiar faces do not require quite so much vertical space in the photograph.
The gathering also offered a snapshot of LSU’s reach across different sports. Reese helped bring the university its first women’s basketball national championship in 2023. Skenes was part of LSU’s College World Series championship team that same year.
Put them beside Shaq, and the walk becomes a moving reminder of how many sporting memories can belong to one campus.
Then Costner enters the picture, and suddenly the whole thing feels like somebody combined a college reunion with a movie premiere.
No complaints here. If your Saturday plans can accommodate Shaq and Kevin Costner in the same frame, your Saturday plans are doing reasonably well.
Former LSU football standout Ryan Clark supplied another bit of entertainment, joking online that this guest list might have ended his own chances of getting a Tiger Walk invitation.
You have to appreciate an alumni gathering so stacked that other famous alumni start checking their credentials.
But the nicest part of the scene is also the simplest: people with enormous careers returning to share a college tradition with the fans.
There is something warmly familiar about that, even when the participants are anything but ordinary. Different careers, different generations, same gathering place.
And Shaq fits that setting beautifully. His presence brings the basketball history, the instant recognition and the unavoidable challenge of getting everyone into one camera frame.
LSU already had the team, the tradition and the crowd.
For this particular walk down Victory Hill, it also had the Big Fella and a supporting cast worthy of opening credits.