Everything Brian Kelly said about his first loss at LSU

I'll begin by congratulating Florida State. They outplayed us in the first half. Certainly, mistake ‑‑ mistake after mistake for us and particularly in the first half. And, you know, obviously more mistakes in the second half.

We started to overcome some of those and played with, I would consider, more of a sense of urgency the last 12 minutes. But our margin for error was so small that we couldn't make any more mistakes.

I was proud of our resolve. We battled. But we just have to learn how to play the game the right way, and that is for four quarters. We didn't play with the kind of sense of urgency that I want for four quarters, and that was evident in our play. We didn't tackle very well. We couldn't get off the field on third down. We didn't execute very well offensively.

We had two turnovers in our punt‑return game, which we thought would be an asset for us. And then we had a blocked field goal and a blocked extra point. Anytime you have those kinds of situations, you're setting yourself up for a long night. And despite all of those things, I stand here in front of you with an opportunity to bring the game into an overtime situation.

So what we did well is we battled. I'm proud of the way we battled. What, obviously, we need to do better is play with a sense of urgency for four quarters, which we did not.

What we learned is we've got to coach better. We've got to have our kids coached in a manner where they're ready. And I'm accountable for that. And we have to have them tackling better, executing better in all phases. So with that, I'll open up to questions.

Q. (Off mic.)

COACH KELLY: Yeah, there's no doubt. I mean, it's an opener and you saw a better rhythm. We had some dropped passes, and we didn't protect as well. That's a good team. Florida State played well. That's why I congratulated them at the very beginning. They ‑‑ for four quarters, they played better football, quite frankly.

But yeah, we got into a better rhythm certainly in the second half, Jayden [Daniels] did. And he's a threat. But we don't want to rely on him having to go back there. And when he does sit in the pocket, we saw his ability to find open receivers, show the patience and in particular on the last touchdown, he stayed in the pocket, showed great patience and found Jaray Jenkins in the back of the end zone.

Q. (Question about special teams.)

COACH KELLY: I've been doing this a long time. You put a guy back there, a guy like Malik Nabers, you watch him, you evaluate him through four weeks of practice, and you feel comfortable with his elite skill set and his mindset that he's going to be able to do a great job, and that wasn't the case. That was a mistake that we made.

He wants to do it, and we'll have to reevaluate that situation. He's a great kid. We didn't lose the game because he dropped those two punts. We miraculously were able to overcome those. You usually wouldn't. But that's ‑‑ you know, that's on us. We made that evaluation. We watched him catch punts, and we felt like he was in a position that he could do that for us.

As it relates to the field goal, it came from the same left side. We made an adjustment after the field goal and made a switch in personnel, and that didn't work either. That's on ‑‑ that's us. We have to do a better job coaching.

Q. Talk about mistakes.

COACH KELLY: No. We ‑‑ we felt like we could get off the field on third down. We thought we would tackle better. But you don't go through camp tackling at the level that you're trying to tackle the quarterback here at Florida State. It's very difficult.

And we had a hard time getting him on the ground, quite frankly. And we have some pretty good players that couldn't get him on the ground. But we didn't tackle very well. We didn't communicate as effectively as we needed to on the back‑end of our defense. And again, that's coaching and that's execution. And we're all in this together. Players and coaches alike. We have to go back tomorrow and go back to work and get better at those things.

But no, we didn't go through camp and go, Wow, this is ‑‑ we are who we are. We have all these holes. We didn't expect a lot of the mistakes we saw out there today. But as coaches, we have to be critical of ourselves and look at our evaluation and say that we're part of this as well and we've got to do a better job coaching.

Q. (Question about Maason Smith.)

COACH KELLY: No, it's ‑‑ that's a knee that he'll get an MRI first thing in the morning.

Q. (Off mic.)

COACH KELLY: For a slight moment but felt like in that situation, it was the prudent and percentage‑wise that we were going to be able to execute it.

Q. (Question about the offensive line.)

COACH KELLY: Well, I mean, I think their front is very good. They brought a lot of pressure. Their defensive ends were a challenge, you know, for a true freshman and our right tackle. They battled. Like I said, I mean, we were in a position to play much better I think as they settled in. It's a first‑game situation. I'll have to look at the film and give you a better evaluation.

Q. (Off mic.)

COACH KELLY: Yeah, I mean, lack of communication is one way to put it. I would just say as this game is moving fast, it's making sure that you're not tipping off coverages and making sure you're leveraging the football the right way as well as communicating. And yeah, these guys haven't played a ton of football and they're going to get better.

Look, I'm not here to say we take any solace in a loss. That's not why I'm here at LSU, to learn about great lessons in losses. But the reality of it is, we've got some ‑‑ some learning to do. We've got to coach better, and we've got to play better.

Q. (Question about Maason Smith.)

COACH KELLY: I had just said that he'll have an MRI in the morning.

Q. (Off mic.)

COACH KELLY: You know, I think it's like anything else, you know, here's a great player trying to make plays, maybe trying to do a little too much. Trying to catch the ball before he had it. And I wouldn't ‑‑ I wouldn't read too much into it. I think he learned tonight that he's just got to let the game come to him.

There's going to be some nights where he doesn't get all the balls. There's so much ‑‑ you know, that young man has so many ‑‑ so much on his shoulders. We just got to get to him and tell him to let the game come to him. He's going to get his catches and not to press as much.

Q. (Off mic.)

COACH KELLY: Oh, yeah. We knew he was part of ‑‑ their offensive structure runs through him.

Q. (Question about Jayden Daniels.)

Q. Oh, my quarterback? Well, as I said earlier, we didn't ‑‑ we didn't want him ‑‑ those weren't ‑‑ those were scrambles that he was smart. There was a lot of man coverage. So we're telling our quarterback, we've got a lot of bare front. We've got a lot of pressure fronts, and that was a game plan that we hadn't seen from them. And if he didn't feel like there was somebody open, that's the dimension that he brings and that's running the football. So that's the one thing you're going to give up, if you've got guys turning their back and running, and we took advantage of that.

Q. (Off mic.)

COACH KELLY: Yeah, certainly. And again, I'm not here to ‑‑ we're not happy with the outcome. We have to play better. We've got to coach better.

But I'm proud of the way our guys competed, and there ‑‑ there's going to be good days for this football team. But they've got to recognize and our coaches have to recognize we've got to put them in good positions, and we've got to play with a sense of urgency.

We saw, when we played with a sense of urgency, we came up with big stops and we answered every score. And I think the tempo of the offense improved. Players looked comfortable out there. We ran the ball in tough areas when we needed to. That's good football, and we didn't have enough of that.

Q. The defense seemed to struggle making stops on third down. What was the reason for that?

COACH KELLY: If I could give you one particular reason that we could have settled into, we would have made even more adjustments. It was a variety of things. Most of it had to do with their quarterback improvising.

We had them dead to right on two or three occasions. We didn't get him on the ground, quite frankly. And when you don't get that kid on the ground, he makes some really good impromptu plays. And sometimes we weren't downing coverage close enough on body. But by and large, not getting off the field was a major factor in tonight's game, no doubt.