“We're playing with inexperienced young players” - Brian Kelly's post-game conference has LSU HC uncovering his team's drawbacks against Ole Miss

Ole Miss managed to hang on to its six-point lead in the dying embers of the Week 5 matchup with Brian Kelly's LSU. The Rebels edged out the Tigers 55-49 in a game that went down to the wire.

With eight minutes on the clock, LSU scored a 34-yard pass touchdown on a very controversial call by the officials. Receiver Brian Thomas Jr. seemed to step out of bounds before setting both feet on the ground during the reception. As things stood, The Tigers were leading 49-40, and the game seemed over.

The Ole Miss defense stood up to the moment and quickly passed to the Rebels offense. Quarterback Jaxson Dart continued his fantastic form in the game, leading them in a drive where he scored the rushing TD, putting the game 47-49 with 5:06 on the clock.

Again, Ole Miss's defense showed up, and LSU had to give the ball back to the Rebels offense with 1:43 minutes remaining. With 39 seconds left, everybody would have thought coach Lane Kiffin would have tried to run the clock and send in the field goal unit.

That's not the Rebels style, though, as Jaxson Dart threw a 13-yard pass to Tre Harris, who scored the game's final touchdown. In the two-point conversion attempt, Quinshon Judkins made the successful rush.

Ole Miss's defense managed to hold on for the half a minute left in the game, almost catching an interception at one point. Both teams committed unnecessary penalties several times during this final drive, with LSU's false starts being way more costly. Brian Kelly was also criticized for some issues with substitutions that cost the Tigers some penalties.

LSU coach Brian Kelly seemed to take a swipe at this mistakes during his press conference by saying:

"I mean, we are playing with inexperienced young players, and that's who we have. There's nobody else walking through the door."

Kelly might start to feel the heat, as the Tigers started the season with playoffs on their mind, and now they would start to wonder if they can make it to the bowl season. The team lost in Week 1 versus Florida State, which was ranked lower than they were at the time, and now it fell to a team that was ranked No. 20 while they were at No. 13.

Brian Kelly also expressed his dislike for the high-scoring style of the contest while stating that the game could have easily gone the other way. Jayden Daniels threw for 414 yards with four touchdowns for LSU.

LSU's offense was up to the expectation of the game, while the defense has to be something that Brian Kelly will have to look at. They surrendered 706 yards to the Ole Miss offense.

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Ole Miss's victory by the numbers against Brian Kelly's LSU

Jaxson Dart had a monstrous game with 389 passing yards with four touchdown passes while also running for 50 yards with one rushing touchdown. He was the definition of the dual-threat quarterback in a game in which he was unstoppable. Quinshon Judkins was the Rebels' lead rusher with 177 rushing yards with one touchdown. He also converted a 2-point attempt.

Ulysses Bently IV had a respectable 90 rushing yards with one touchdown. Tre Harris and Jordan Watkins had over 100 receiving yards and one touchdown reception. Ole Miss made up for lost time from last week by recording 706 total yards in offense.

Ole Miss registered 389 passing yards and 317 rushing yards, the first time in 25 years against a league opponent that the school recorded 300 or more yards in both categories in the same game.

It was also a record-breaking home crowd for the Rebels, with 66,703 fans packing the Vaught Hemingway Stadium on Saturday. Coach Lane Kiffin praised the fans for their faith in the team:

"For them to show up today after us losing [last week] and set the record for highest attendance in school history for a game — we say, ‘do things better than they’ve ever been done before,’ it’s a motto we have — that’s awesome, you could feel it in the game. Certainly, you could feel it in the fourth quarter. It was really, really neat to have that electric environment."

The Ole Miss Rebels next take on the Arkansas Razorbacks on Saturday, Oct. 7. As for Brian Kelly's LSU Tigers, they play the No. 21 Missouri Tigers in Week 6.