Copyright Baton Rouge Advocate
LSU was going to pare down its playbook. Instead of running a wide variety of plays, the Tigers would focus on mastering the concepts they could already run efficiently. "We went into that process about three weeks ago through the bye week," Kelly said during his weekly Monday press conference, "and I think it's proved to be effective for us." Kelly has a point. The Tigers had over 400 yards of offense in their next game against South Carolina. They then scored 24 points this past Saturday against Vanderbilt — the most it had scored against an FBS opponent this year — while averaging 4.8 yards per rush. Improvements have been made, but they weren't enough to take down the Commodores on the road or satisfy the anger of a frustrated fanbase. "If you really want to take the big picture, I was pleased with a lot of things, but it's the outcomes," Kelly said. "Our fan base wants positive outcomes, and I get that. There's nothing that brings the community together better than an LSU victory. And so we clearly understand that." Even after watching the film, Kelly's takeaways from Saturday's offensive performance didn't change much. There were too many situations where the Tigers needed a touchdown, but settled for a field goal instead. The most obvious of those lost opportunities came in the fourth quarter when LSU, trailing by 10, settled for a field goal after sophomore running back Caden Durham's 51-yard run placed the Tigers in first and goal at the 2-yard line. Turning those types of possessions into touchdowns has been an issue for the Tigers dating back to last year. "We settled for field goals and they got touchdowns," Kelly said. "And that ultimately was the difference." But don't expect Kelly to take over playcalling duties in those moments, or start overruling Sloan's decision-making within games at any point moving forward. "Play calling is an art and a science. It's both, right?" Kelly said. "And if you start getting involved in that too much it does, in my opinion, over my career, it's not the best thing." Kelly did add that he has veto power over certain play calls and has used that power in the past. But most of his involvement with LSU's offense deals with the Tigers' game planning throughout the week. "I think, from my perspective, that's the best place for me," Kelly said. But, from a coaching standpoint, whatever the solution is for LSU's offense has to be found this week. The Tigers are a loss away from being essentially eliminated from the College Football Playoff discussion, and their next two contests are against top-5 opponents in Texas A&M and Alabama. If the Tigers can't figure it out now, this season may go down as a lost cause for an offense that entered the year with high hopes. "We're disappointed with the loss, don't get me wrong, and we want to do better for our fan base. We get that," Kelly said. "But having said that, there were a lot of things that we can take away from the game that we need to build on."
