BATON ROUGE, La. -- LSU's 2011 season will be remembered for challenging Les Miles' crisis-management skills over and over again.

It also could go down as the greatest season in the history of a program that has been around since 1893.

Now, within one victory of an unbeaten season and a BCS national title, Miles has been voted The Associated Press coach of the year.

Of 56 votes cast, 30 went to Miles. Bill Snyder of Kansas State was second with 16; Mike Gundy of Oklahoma State had six;

Brady Hoke of Michigan got three and Lane Kiffin of

USC had one.

As Miles reflected on the various trials he dealt with this season in an interview with the AP this week, he spoke in a hushed tone and recounted a talk he had long ago with his father in the kitchen of his childhood home in Elyria, Ohio.

When Miles was about 12 years old, he was worried about his

dad, Hope "Bubba" Miles, who'd been passed over for a promotion and subsequently laid off, all while dealing with the death of his own father.

"We'll be fine," the LSU coach recalled his father telling him. "It's the reaction to the difficult times; it's always those

days when something does not come your way and you have to make the best move -- that's what's going to make your life rich."

However LSU's season ends Jan. 9 in the BCS title game against No. 2 Alabama in the Superdome, it will go down as one of the

more memorable chapters in the history of Louisiana's most storied

college football program. The events that could have derailed the 2011 campaign were numerous and diverse, yet the Tigers dominated

just about every team they faced.

There was a preseason bar fight that led to starting quarterback Jordan Jefferson's early season suspension. There was a preseason coaching shuffle brought on by former offensive coordinator Steve

Kragthorpe's Parkinson's disease diagnosis.

Starting receiver Russell Shepard was suspended three games because he talked out of turn about an NCAA probe of a scouting service.