Why Alabama Should Fear LSU in the Upcoming Game.
By Larry Burton
The logic is there to rate this upcoming game with LSU as a done deal for the Tide. LSU was beaten by Ole Miss, a team Alabama blanked 25-0. They also lost to Georgia in a game that showed the huge weaknesses in the Tiger defense and they barely got by Florida in a game where their offense was exposed as being pedestrian against a quality defense.
Yes, there are many reasons for the Tide fans not to fear the Tiger in this year’s LSU game, but I’d like to introduce you to some reasons why they should.
Zach Mettenberger is a streaky quarterback, so was South Carolina quarterback Stephen Garcia. When he played the game of his life against Alabama, he beat them and beat them badly. Zach Mettenberger has put up much better numbers at times and proven that when he’s on, he’s really on.
When Alabama has lost games, it’s because a quarterback played the game of his season, made less mistakes than the Tide’s offense. Now if you’re one of those Alabama fans who say Mettenberger couldn’t carry McCarron’s jock strap, well, look again.
In 2013, McCarron has not put up numbers or completion ratios that are close to what Mettenberger has put up. Mettenberger has thrown up some 80% completion ratios against SEC opponents while McCarron’s best is 78%. Against SEC teams, McCarron’s best completion ratio is 69.78.
Yes, Mettenberger has had some bad games, some real stinkeroos in fact, and that makes it harder for the Tide to prepare because you have no idea which quarterback will show up on gameday. But that’s exactly just like Garcia at South Carolina. We prepared for a struggling quarterback who would rely on the run and had a guy show up who played like top quarterback in football and blitzed past the Tide before they could regroup.
Mettenberger could do that too.
Reason number two that the Tide should be worried is the LSU defense. They started the season is disary as they replaced so many starters that went to the NFL and graduation. They are beginning to come around now and the LSU defensive coordinator, John Chavis, is someone I hold a ton of respect for. He is one of the deans of SEC defenses and he’ll have his boys ready for this game.
Earlier in the year, LSU was rated as low as the nation’s 80th best defenses, now they’ve risen to the nation’s number 21 defense.
Chavis has a history of knowing how to frustrate McCarron and they’ll do all the can to make him uncomfortable. In a loss to LSU in 2011, McCarron couldn’t manage a touchdown and had a completion ratio of just 57% and in the follow up game the next year, which Alabama won, he had an even worse day with a completion ratio of just 51%. In fact McCarron’s best game against LSU wasn’t all that great and that was in the the rematch game in 2011 for the national championship. Even though Alabama won the game 21-0, McCarron was just 67.6% in his completion ratio.
Given these stats, it’s clear that Chavis knows how to rattle McCarron.
Thirdly, since LSU knows that this game isn’t for the SEC West title and by all intelligent discussion is out of the SEC race, they’ll play in a go for broke manner which could make them hard to prepare for.
Les Miles already has a reputation of being a coach who will take chances and go “outside the box” in his play calling. Such a team is always dangerous. Alabama will have to be ready for off side kicks at strange times, jail house blitzes and lots of trick plays from LSU.
Lastly, LSU simply does not fear the Tide and has confidence in these games. Except for the 21-0 embarrassment in the 2011 National Championship Game, the regular season games since Saban’s arrival have been even, with Alabama winning three and LSU winning three. Also, almost all the games in this series have been nail biters with two of the games going to overtime, again with Alabama winning one and LSU winning the other.
Of course with all this being said, I am still picking the Crimson Tide to prevail in this game, but at least you are now aware that it may not be as easy a win as some fans my expect and if it does in fact go wrong, you’ll know why it did.
Larry is an award winning writer whose work has appeared in almost every college football venue. Now he primarily writes for Touchdown Alabama Magazine. https://twitter.com/LBSportswriter
