As his football team begins its preparation for this weekend’s matchup with Towson, LSU coach Les Miles was just happy to be able to practice Monday.
“This time last week, we were running for cover,” Miles said.
At his weekly press luncheon Monday, Miles said his team would move to its normal routine this week after last week’s bomb scare.
Last week’s disruption might have been a cause for LSU’s undisciplined play at Auburn, where it gave up 80 yards on nine penalties. Miles said although the referees made “legitimate calls” and he “would not argue,” he was going to speak to the head of the Southeastern Conference’s officials to hear his view.
Miles questioned a personal foul called on senior defensive end Lavar Edwards when he leveled Auburn sophomore quarterback Kiehl Frazier, who had just thrown an interception.
“I’m certain that there’ll be a view of that from the conference, and I will comply,” Miles said. “… It was a legal block. It could only have been the timing of the block.”
He also said some of the penalties came from several “good, clean, honest mistakes” and from LSU players pulling others off the pile that often accumulates at the end of plays.
“Our guys have to recognize how the game’s going to be officiated,” Miles said. “… It’s always been the unfortunate position of the retaliation that gets the penalty.”
Junior fullback J.C. Copeland also found error with the officiating, saying he had recovered the fumble referees awarded Auburn after a bad snap between junior quarterback Zach Mettenberger and sophomore offensive lineman Elliott Porter in the first quarter.
Junior defensive end Sam Montgomery caused his own chaos along the line with 3.5 of his four tackles going for a loss, the first of which resulted in a safety. Add a sack, and the performance was good enough to earn for him the honor of SEC Defensive Player of the Week.
“There was not any ‘tired’ in his game,” Miles said. “After he made those tackles, he had plenty of opportunity to jump around.”
Miles praised Montgomery’s leadership and halftime speech, which LSU Sports Information Director Michael Bonnette called “legendary” on Twitter.
Whatever Montgomery said worked, as the defense shut Auburn out in the second half to allow a two-point LSU victory.
“At halftime, you could tell a lot of the guys’ demeanors were kind of low,” Mettenberger said. “It was a tough game and a lot of the guys, when you have a young team, they haven’t experienced a tough game like that. The leaders stepped up at halftime and made sure that [we didn’t] get down on ourselves — just to keep playing football and the rest will take care of itself. Luckily, that’s what happened.”
Though many of the questions during Monday’s news conference referred back to LSU’s first SEC contest, Miles found time to talk about Football Championship Series opponent Towson and its sophomore running back Terrance West, who’s recorded 34 touchdowns in 14 games.
“[He’s] a very, very talented guy — a guy that’s elusive and got good ball skills,” Miles said. “He’s a really good player. They have good players.”
