Brian Kelly offers a candid response to LSU's lackluster win
Brian Kelly wasn’t happy after LSU’s win over Louisiana Tech, nor should he have been. The Tigers never looked crisp in Saturday’s win, and for a head coach who is trying to win his first national title and take LSU back to the playoffs, performances like that can’t happen.
“We are happy with the win. We’re not happy with the production across the board. We got to coach better, that’s the bottom line. And tonight, we didn’t coach well enough. We got outcoached in a lot of Hats off to Coach (Sonny) Cumbie and his staff at La Tech; they did a great job tonight,” Kelly opened up last night. You know, you’ve got to run the football. We didn’t run the football effectively tonight, and it made it difficult for us. We didn’t make great decisions. So, players got to make plays, and coaches got to coach better. You can tell by my voice I’m not happy with the performance, but it’s a win.”
When asked about a lack of focus or intensity, Kelly pushed back on the narrative and instead cited execution as the big issue for both his staff and his team.
“I don’t know that we lacked intensity. The execution was not very good. And I’m gonna lean on this again. I’m not just giving you something; I’m telling you from my heart, we’ve got to coach better,” Kelly said postgame. “We’ve got to put our kids in position. We got good players. We’ve got to do better. We’ve got to do better because they’re good players. Now they’ve got to make some plays. We left some plays out there, but this is all us, right? This is coaches and players together. Did not have the kind of performance tonight that we expect from our coaches and players.”
Top 10
- 1New
Eli Drinkwitz comes clean
Knew rule was broken
- 2
Deion Sanders
Fires back at media
- 3Hot
Big 12 punishes ref crew
Costly mistake in Kansas-Mizzou
- 4Trending
CFP Top 25
Predicting Top 25 after Week 2
- 5
National Title odds
Numbers shift after Week 2
Get the Daily On3 Newsletter in your inbox every morning
By clicking "Subscribe to Newsletter", I agree to On3's Privacy Notice, Terms, and use of my personal information described therein.
Across the country, perceived top teams struggled against “lesser competition”, so it’s not just LSU that didn’t live up to the hype. The Tigers left with a win, but there wasn’t much joy or jubilation when they exited the field. They disappointed and they know it. This isn’t the showing they wanted after an emotional opener last week; it’s not the standard. Good teams win games, while great teams leave no doubt. LSU failed to do that, and it’s time to make sure this group has the right mentality with Florida limping into town next week. A wounded animal in the corner is dangerous, and the Gators embody that as they roll into Baton Rouge.
“If I didn’t think we had the players, I’d be in here giving you the Coach Kelly spin. I’d give you everything that I could come up with about how great we are. We got better players on this roster, and we got to coach them better. And they got to execute too. I mean, this is all in on everybody,” Kelly said. “This isn’t just Oh, our coaches stink or our players stink. This is because everybody collectively did not live up to the standard that we have set here. And you can only do that when you believe that you have more, and we have more. And that didn’t show up tonight, and that’s disappointing. Now I need to get over it. I need to get ready for Florida because they’re going to come in, you know, after what happened this past weekend, and they’re going to play their absolute best football.”
