Joel Klatt is among those singing the praises of LSU following its season-opening victory over Clemson.

He also isn’t giving up on Dabo Swinney’s team after one game.

Klatt, Fox Sports’ lead college football analyst, says LSU’s win at Clemson proves that Brian Kelly’s squad should be the favorite in the SEC.

“Brian Kelly now clearly has a team that is his best, most talented team that he’s ever had,” Klatt said on The Joel Klatt Show. “… They’ve built a really good team, and that’s a team that everyone in that conference is going to have to reckon with. I imagine that defense at home, with their home crowd, that could be the best defense in the country. That LSU team – most complete team so far of Week 1. I thought they were tremendous.”

Coming into the season opener, Clemson was ranked fourth in the AP Poll and one of the media darlings of the offseason. While LSU’s win derailed the Clemson hype train after Clemson was showered with love all offseason, Klatt remains high on Swinney’s team.

Before Week 1, Klatt picked Clemson to win the national championship, and even after the opening loss, he believes the Tigers are still one of the nation’s best teams.

“I’m not too scared about Clemson,” he said. “I still think they’re an elite team and they could still certainly make a deep run into the playoffs and potentially play for a national championship. That was an excellent game and a great environment.”

Klatt says Clemson was “right there” in the close loss to LSU, and that Cade Klubnik and company “just made a few too many mistakes.”

“Their quarterback made a few too many mistakes,” he said. “And then the biggest question for me was this experienced offensive line that was coming back for Clemson, I thought was going to be a strength, and they got manhandled by LSU’s defensive front. Now, do I think there are a lot of defensive fronts that can mimic what LSU did? Probably not. So, is Clemson going to be just fine? Yes. Because guess what, just like Texas [at Ohio State], they’re driving with the ball late to tie the game in a one-score possession. They get stopped on fourth down. Kudos to LSU. That was a great game. Both of those teams, really good teams, and both of those teams should be in the playoff.”

Even with Miami and Florida State earning top-10 victories over Notre Dame and Alabama, respectively, Klatt still thinks Clemson is probably the team to beat in the ACC moving forward.

“I still think, even based on everything that we saw in the ACC over the course of the weekend, with a big win for Miami, with a big win for Florida State, I still think Clemson’s probably the best team in the conference,” he said. “They just ran up against what was the most complete team in college football in Week 1, the LSU Tigers.”