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After finding itself in the top 15 in the first edition of the College Football Playoff rankings, LSU football has seen its season spiral out of control over the last two weeks. An embarrassing blowout loss at home against Alabama in Week 11 knocked the Tigers outside of the top 20, Brian Kelly and LSU were upset by Florida in a lifeless performance on Saturday.
LSU and Florida battled in a very close game for much of Saturday afternoon in Gainesville, but Florida was eventually able to turn the screw and pull away with a 27-16 win thanks to an excellent fourth quarter. During the game, Kelly was seen yelling at wide receiver Chris Hilton Jr. and was also getting yelled at by another player.
After the game, Kelly explained why tensions were so high on the LSU sideline, according to the Associated Press via ESPN.
“This is a simple exercise of do you want to fight or not?” Kelly said after the game, per AP. “Do you want to fight and take responsibility as coaches and players that we're not playing well and we're struggling right now? There's a rough spot here that we have to fight through, and we have to do it together.”
LSU struggled to find consistent offense in this one, as it was clearly bothered by both the Florida defense and the crowd noise in The Swamp. After a Florida touchdown gave the Gators a seven-point lead, an LSU drive fizzled out in a field goal attempt before another Florida touchdown put the game away.
LSU's Garrett Nussmeier fizzling out in November
Through the month of October, Garrett Nussmeier had LSU right in the middle of the race for the SEC title and had also thrust himself into the conversation as QB1 in the 2025 NFL Draft. Nussmeier is still right there in the draft conversation, but his play has fallen off dramatically of late as LSU has fallen out of contention for its biggest goals.
LSU has lost three consecutive games now, starting with that disastrous second half against Texas A&M back on Oct. 26 where Nussmeier threw three interceptions. He then threw a pair of picks in that blowout loss against Alabama. Nussmeier didn't turn the ball over against Florida, but he did fumble twice.
Over the last few weeks, Nussmeier has looked uncomfortable in the pocket and has been very skittish against three of the best defenses on LSU's schedule, and the offense has felt frantic and a bit out of control as a result. The explosive passing game that diced up Ole Miss' defense has become more pedestrian.
That isn't going to work while LSU is sporting a defense that is serviceable, but still isn't among the SEC's elite especially up front. The LSU defensive line got bullied by both Texas A&M and Alabama on the ground, allowing those teams to control the clock and get ahead against LSU. Unless Nussmeier starts playing lights-out again, it could be a difficult finish to the season for this LSU team.
