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It hasn’t been an easy start to the 2023 season for LSU head coach Brian Kelly, not after the Tigers’ forgettable performance in their season-opening blowout loss to Florida State on Labor Day weekend.
But a blowout win over Grambling in Week 2 helped get things right in Baton Rouge, and then the 1st half happened on Saturday afternoon in LSU’s SEC opener at Mississippi State.
The Tigers were on point and showed they were ready to start defense of their SEC West title, taking a 24-7 lead into the locker room against the 2-0 Bulldogs. They served notice, and in particular Kelly’s passing combination of Jayden Daniels and Malik Nabers did the talking with a virtuoso 1st-half performance.
Nabers went off, catching 10 passes for 188 yards with 2 touchdowns in the 1st 30 minutes, and Kelly’s quarterback completed all but 1 of his 22 passing attempts for 255 yards as LSU stormed ahead.
Kelly was impressed, telling ESPN on the way to the locker room regarding Nabers’ dominance and his team’s play in general:
“Obviously, we’re taking advantage of some one-on-one matchups. They got overaggressive on the last play, and we got them on a double move. You have to do this. This is an aggressive defense, and they’re giving us some one-on-one matchups. We’re going to start running the football, too, if they get into some double zones and disappointed that we gave up a long run on just a simple crack replace by our corner. We just got to do the little things the right way in the 3rd quarter.”
Cory Nightingale, a former sportswriter and sports editor at the Miami Herald and Palm Beach Post, is a South Florida-based freelance writer who covers Alabama for SaturdayDownSouth.com.
