We got our asses kicked. LSU is simply not in the same league as the very best teams in the country. We've got the talent, but there is something missing from this year's team. Though, to LSU's credit, the team kept fighting all the way to the final whistle. Which is more than I can say for the fanbase, which left in droves. The Tiger Stadium crowd never got into the game, and the fans failed to live up our reputation as wild and crazy. That place was quiet as church, and it didn't escape the notice of CBS's announcers.
Going into this season, the strength of the team was supposed to be the defense. Well, for the second straight big game, the defense got torched for over 50 points. You can blame Lee for two pick-sixes, but the D is still on the hook for 38 points. And that's just not acceptable. Whenver we needed a big stop, the D failed to come through. There was almost no pressure on Stafford all night, and Moreno popped big run after after big run.
Even with all of that, LSU actually gained more yards than Georgia. But there was not a feeling that LSU's offense was humming on the same level as Georgia's. Lee, of course, had two big INT's in the first half. I don't really care about the third one thrown in desperation. Lee is just prone to making really, really bad decisions. Which is what you get when you start a freshman. It's the growing pains that comes with a young quarterback still trying to adjust.
There were a few positives. Scott had a nice game. Keiland busted a few big runs. Colt David became LSU's all time leading scorer. I was serious that I liked how the team didn't give up. But really, LSU got beat every which way, and they never were really in it. It's a rebuilding year, and rebuilding years are frustrating because you can see the talent if they could just put it all together. But it's not happening right now.
This is a good team, it's just not a great team. Both losses were to top ten teams. We're not in their class. Hopefully, we can start picking up the pieces so we'll be back in the hunt next year. It sucks to go through it, but we all pretty much expected our team to be in about this place this season.
OK, I didn't expect the defense to be this bad. The co-defensive co-oridnator experiement is clearly not working. Miles needs to make an offseason change to get the defense back to where it was. Or even just above average. Becuase this team has too many defensive playmakers to be allowing 50 points twice in a season. And right now, this defense aspires to be average.