What Brian Kelly said on Tuesday, what it means for LSU moving forward

LSU lost its season-opening game against Florida State on Sunday and the discourse since then has been dire. Fans want answers as the Tigers’ failed to live up to expectations in the first game of the year. How bad is this team? What are some of the answers?

Head coach Brian Kelly took the podium on Tuesday afternoon to take questions from the media about his team and in the 30 minutes hit on some of the key topics people around the country are wondering about this LSU team.

Here are the four quotes that stood out to me, what they mean for LSU moving forward, and what to take from them.

Harold Perkins’ usage 

“It’s certainly a question that we have talked about. There’s a lot going on and you could clearly look at Harold and what he’s asked to do versus lining him up off the edge. Player development has to be thought about. there he goes at the next level has to be thought about and then impact our team, so I think that there is a I think there’s a happy medium there that we could probably strike and we’ve already begun to look at how we can be most effective for Harold and for LSU.”

What it means

I understand wanting to develop him for the long term both at LSU and for the NFL, but I mentioned this in fall camp, you started the season with Florida State. This was not the time to take the training wheels off of him. Especially in a game where Maason Smith did not play and the pass game carved up your secondary, LSU had Perkins playing 28 snaps in coverage to help with his future in the NFL?

That just makes no sense to me. I said in the spring that there was no way this would happen, but here we are.

Kelly hints that they’re trying to strike a better balance, and I do think there’s a balance here, but if a 28:7 ration of coverage to pass rush doesn’t turn into at least 50/50, then LSU’s ceiling is considerably lower as a defense.

Run game

“We’ve got to be much more balanced in terms of a running attack. Jaden Daniels can’t be our leading rusher week in and week out. So our backs have got to touch the ball. So there’s got to be more balance there to get a true evaluation of the offensive line. I mean, when you’re talking about just a couple of carries for each back…In those crucial situations, you know, we’ve got to be better. There’s no doubt.”

What it means

Pretty standard coach speak here, but I like the answer about Daniels not being their leading rusher moving forward. The run game is so reliant on him being the star, but in standard rushing downs, the offensive line got blown off the ball time after time. I asked Kelly the question about the offensive line in the run game and I understand it was limited sample size (12 carries from RBs), but I saw enough to want to try Zalance Heard at right tackle. FSU has one of the better defensive lines in the country, but there’s no reason LSU couldn’t get any sort of push up front for an entire game.

Secondary

“We knew that there were going to be some matchup issues. I want to go back to where I started and when I say this game of football is hard, it requires such an attention to detail when it comes to it’s not just about your ability. You have to apply the technique and the traits necessary if you want to succeed in this game. And we just didn’t do a good enough job, whether it was at the cornerback position or whether it was at the safety position. If you’re supposed to be in a particular position, you need to be there. And that’s where a number of things broke down for us, and in particular at corner.”

What it means

LSU knew it was in for a long night against these receivers. Kelly said there was some bad technique at cornerback, mental mistakes, but to me, the biggest problem was that FSU has some really good receivers. If technique was bad AND you are physically outmatched at the position, this is what it looks like.

I just can’t figure out why Matt House went into this game not trying to throw a curveball at the Seminoles. He didn’t blitz Harold Perkins. He didn’t double Coleman or Wilson to my knowledge. He just kept throwing the same pitch knowing that he didn’t have the personnel to stop the Seminoles. I’ll repeat what I’ve said since March: If the Tigers can’t get Denver Harris on the field, then the secondary’s ceiling is significantly lower. We saw it in game one and Brian Kelly knows it.

Thinking the right way

“The bottom line is I’ve got to get our football team thinking the right way and play with the competitive edge and football this game of football. It is hard to win. If you don’t play with a competitive edge, if you are not locked in and discipline and focus 

We can have a conversation about all these things all the time. If you have a competitive edge, if you recognize how hard this game is and you’re focused, none of the crap that I just mentioned will matter because they’ll overcome it.“

What it means

This was the most passionate part of Kelly’s press conference and it’s clear he’s frustrated that he’s in this spot. He said after the game this wasn’t the football team he thought it was. I think he had extreme confidence going into this game and was shocked that his team got ran out of the building like that. 

Not having a competitive edge is one of the more worrying things a coach can say about his team because that falls back on leadership from top to bottom. The Tigers last year routinely won the second halves of games and scrapped their way to 10 wins, but at the first sign of adversity in 2023, they crumbled. Kelly mentioned that this year’s team hadnt felt the lows that last year’s team had. This year’s team had a lot of guys who just made the SEC title game and entered the year ranked in the top five.

Well, here’s the rude awakening. Kelly’s press conference was all about urgency and lighting that fire. It’s only up from here.