Florida proves it belongs, but falls short against LSU

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What a difference a year makes.

Last season, Florida’s defense forced nine LSU punts. After a key Feleipe Franks interception in the end zone while trailing, the defense forced two straight punts by LSU. The defense surrendered 5.0 yards per play overall and 4.4 yards per rush.

LSU’s offense is different this year.

This year, the Tigers averaged 10.6 yards per play against the Gators. Not only that, but LSU averaged an unbelievable 9.1 yards per rush on 24 carries. The Gators only force two punts, one because LSU jumped on a fourth-and-3 before they could run a play.

After a key Kyle Trask interception in the end zone while trailing, LSU immediately scored on a 4-play, 80-yard drive that put the game out of reach.

I’m impressed by the way Florida played in this game. In a hostile environment, the Gators stood toe-to-toe with LSU and were up 28-21 after opening the second half with an impressive touchdown drive.

But LSU came right back with a score, got two straight three-and-outs (scoring after the first), and was able to put the game away with the deep throw to Jamar Chase after the Trask interception.

Florida’s goals are still in front of them. But there are no moral victories in the SEC. They had a chance to walk out of Death Valley with a win and were unable to do so.

This one stings, for a bunch of reasons.

Defensive Futility

Florida came into the game ranked 18th in yards per play allowed. They then proceeded to help make LSU look like the 2007 New England Patriots.

Those fans who scoffed at the quality of defense that LSU had played coming in should be convinced now: LSU is an elite offense. But nobody is 10.6 yards per attempt good. After all, the Tigers only averaged 9.0 yards per play against Northwestern State.

Florida helped the Tigers in a bunch of different ways, none more obvious than their atrocious run defense.

On this play, Florida has six men in the box against six blockers for LSU. LSU does a good job getting to the linebackers and absolutely mauling them. The only player with a chance to prevent this from being a huge play is safety Shawn Davis (#31), and he’s both unable to make the tackle and unable to slow down Edwards-Helaire enough for pursuit to catch up.

On this play, linebacker Ventrell Miller (#51) hesitates to fill his gap. His job is to funnel Edwards-Helaire back to the inside for help from David Reese (#33) and Brad Stewart (#2). Instead, he is able to get to the outside, Stewart gets picked and LSU had a 21-14 lead.

All in all, Florida gave up three huge runs for 129 yards. On the third play, one of the defensive linemen was out of position and was running over to fill the gap as the ball was snapped.

But even without those big plays, LSU still averaged 4.3 yards per rush, which was right at its season average. You could accept LSU gashing you on the ground if you stopped LSU through the air. But Florida didn’t do that either.

LSU QB Joe Burrow averaged 12.2 yards per throw and had a yards above replacement (YAR) for the game of 4.66, well above his YAR of 3.33 coming into the game.

Burrow was flawless, only throwing three incompletions and adding 43 yards rushing on 8 carries. LSU only went 1-4 on third down opportunities because the Gators couldn’t force any third downs.

The three big running plays were supplemented by four big plays in the passing game. And at no point did Burrow throw an incompletion that even had a chance of being picked off. Of course, it’s easy to do that when you have this kind of time.

Here, Burrow has all day to scan the field. Asking your defensive backs to hold up for five seconds is a recipe for disaster.

And LSU was also able to work off of the big runs by running run/pass option plays.

Here, Burrow pulls the ball and completes a throw across the middle. At the snap, Marlon Dunlap (#91) and Jabari Zuniga (#92) get blown backwards. This forces Brad Stewart (#2) to come up to stop the run and Burrow whips the pass right by him for a first down.

Finally, LSU was able to hit the kill shot.

Here, linebacker Ventrell Miller (#51) is in coverage on the boundary against Edwards-Helaire (#22). C.J. Henderson (#1) is in one-on-one coverage against Jamar Chase (#1). Edwards-Helaire runs a little rub against Henderson, which should give Chase an advantage, but Henderson has the speed to be able to catch up.

Except that Miller jumps outside like he’s going to pick up Chase. He gets in the way of Henderson and Chase is wide open for a touchdown.

In my preview of this game, I pointed out that these kinds of breakdowns have been occurring in the secondary all year long. Bo Nix and Jarrett Guarantano missed them, or at least didn’t turn them into immediate points.

Joe Burrow did not.

Offense not quite enough

The Florida offense played very well, but – at least compared to LSU – everything felt difficult.

The best way I can show that is by showing this 17-yard run by Lamical Perine.

This is a great individual play. Perine breaks multiple tackles and turns what should be a yard or two loss into a big gain. But that’s part of the problem. LSU running backs weren’t even getting touched until they got to the safety. Florida’s backs had to navigate a lot more traffic to get free.

I was excited that Florida finally showed balance in the first half against LSU, running the ball 22 times versus 21 pass attempts. Perhaps more importantly, Florida had 104 yards rushing in the first half as well, so it was being effective.

But the clock struck midnight for the running game in the second half. The Gators had 18 attempts for 42 yards, a much more familiar per-carry average (2.3) for the 2019 team.

Without the ability to run the ball, the offense got more one-dimensional and the Gators went 5-10 on third downs in the second half after going 4-7 in the first half. That 50 percent conversion rate is actually quite good, but it wasn’t good enough considering the defense couldn’t stop LSU at all.

That’s what made it curious when Dan Mullen decided to bring in Emory Jones with 3:15 left in the third quarter and the Gators at their own 25. It made it even more curious when he left Jones in on third-and-long on that drive and he overshot tight end Kyle Pitts when he had him in one-on-one coverage.

I don’t think Mullen will regret giving Jones that drive. He has a plan he believes in and sticks to it. Sometimes that’s a good thing and sometimes it isn’t. But it’s part of why Mullen is so successful.

The thing I think he’ll regret is that he was unable to get the ball to Kyle Pitts in the second half.

This was one of Pitts’ four first-half receptions for 85 yards. He was targeted (by my count) nine times in that half and for good reason. When you have someone who can make plays like that, you want to get him the ball.

But in the second half, Pitts only had one catch for 20 yards in the second half and was only targeted three times. Now, part of that is because of LSU. There’s a reason Van Jefferson was open repeatedly on the opening drive of the second half. LSU’s safety was shading over towards Pitts, which let Jefferson run free.

But on the most important play of the game – the Trask interception – Pitts was serving as a blocker.

That’s really the only problem I have with this play actually. Florida got exactly what they wanted. In fact, if we look at a still-frame after the fake to the running back, here’s what we see.

Freddie Swain (#16) is in one-on-one coverage with LSU defensive back Derek Stingley (#24) and has inside leverage. It looks like Swain and Trask just had a miscommunication about where the ball should be delivered.

I’d love to see Swain and Pitts switched on this play. But again, Florida got what it wanted and just didn’t execute.

Takeaway

And that’s probably the biggest thing I take away from this game.

Florida had to play a perfect game to win and were unable to do so. The Trask interception really tipped the scales, but so did the three-and-outs after LSU tied the game at 28 and went ahead 35-28.

I often talk about yards per play when gauging teams because sometimes it tells a story much different than the scoreboard. In this case, that is definitely true, with LSU averaging 10.6 yards per play and Florida averaging 5.4.

The Gators offense was pretty good, but the LSU offense was elite. And with that being the case, pretty good wouldn’t cut it.

I know a lot of people will use the logic that Jonathan Greenard was out for the entire game and Jabari Zuniga went down in the second half, but let’s be honest. Florida wasn’t stopping LSU even if both of those guys had been completely healthy.

And actually, using that as an excuse points to the very thing a lot of fans hate when I bring up: recruiting.

While this is not all Dan Mullen’s fault, Florida has brought in seven blue-chip defensive ends and three blue-chip defensive tackles since 2016. Of those 10 players, only one (Zachary Carter) made a tackle in this game. In an SEC schedule, lacking depth will eventually come back to haunt you.

It also shows up on offense, where without Kadarius Toney active, the Gators don’t have a guy who can reliably take the ball to the house. They have a lot of really good options, but nobody you would classify as great.

But there’s one thing I have to keep reminding myself. Florida had a lead in the second half and had LSU on the ropes. The fact that LSU responded just means that Florida needs to continue to improve.

But more than that, it was actually fun to watch the offense with the ball. Even though I think Feleipe Franks was playing well when he went down, it was never a lot of fun to watch the offense when he was in charge.

All of the Gators goals are still in front of them. Win out and they are playing for the SEC Championship and a spot in the playoff.

They may not have beaten LSU, but I think they proved that they are on the cusp of being one of those teams. There was a moment where we all thought they might be able to pull it off before LSU came roaring back.

If Trask can continue to improve, they may just get another shot at the Tigers in Atlanta.

Regardless, there are worse things than a relatively close loss on the road to a top-5 opponent.

Featured image used under Creative Commons license courtesy Tammy Anthony Baker