War of Words: Coaches, Players Discuss the Florida-LSU Clash

Urban Meyer on LSU's '05 win over Florida:

“That seems like about 12 years ago,” Meyer said. “What we saw is a defense that played tremendous defense.  At times they put one more than we could block in our pass protection and they covered everybody. In the past we were confident enough if you do that, we’re going to buy a little time and find the matchup. The negative (was) that the four or five guys we had running routes were covered by the guys from LSU and I mean covered. That was a bad situation.”

Florida players on the '05 loss:

“That game was definitely something we’ve built on,” Florida center Drew Miller said. “Any time you battle a tough team like that and come up short, you can either come together as a team or you go the other direction. Our coaches made we sure we learned from that loss and moved forward and we’ve been going in the right direction ever since.”

“That game taught us that we needed to work harder, push ourselves harder,” Florida receiver Andre Caldwell said. “That’s one of those games that sticks in your mind, even two years later. It makes you want to run a few extra sprints or stay after practice a little longer because you know the guys from LSU are.”

Les Miles on being #1 and how LSU will fare:

“We’re complimented by the vote,” LSU coach Les Miles said, “but in no way, shape or form do we feel like we are a finished product. It also tells you that the voters didn’t get up early in the morning to watch our game.  They kind of slept in and got caught up on the score later in the day.”

He said USC has an explosive team and is “underrepresented” in the AP poll.

“They should be first, probably,” Miles said.

“We certainly played without the focus and the intensity that we’re capable of,” Miles said, “and we certainly understand it. We have a lot to fix.  There’ll be none of our players that arrive here (today) that feel like they’ve achieved any milestone in any way. It’ll be business as usual.”

LSU players on the Florida game:

“Even if we’d had a good game last week,” Hester said, “I think it would have been double the focus and attention just because we did lose to Florida last year and we felt like we shot ourselves in the foot.  It’s Florida. We’re definitely going to be up for it. We’ve got to be focused. We know we’ve got to play our ‘A’ game. If we have all the turnovers like we did last year, we don’t have a chance against a great team like Florida."

“I don’t know what you’d call it,” LSU center Brett Helms said, searching for an explanation. “I guess it was a letdown.  The offensive line didn’t play that well. I take blame for that, and we’re going to fix it. We’re going to fix it.”

“We couldn’t get into a rhythm, we gave up some sacks, and it hurt our confidence a little bit,” LSU right guard Lyle Hitt said. “We got refocused at halftime and came back and played well.”

That's what they have to say.  Here's what I have to say:

Tim Tebow has given Tennessee, Ole Miss and Arkansas nightmares.  This year, the LSU defense's idea of a nightmare is giving up 2 TDs.  Tebow and LSU DT Glenn Dorsey don't exactly see eye to eye.  I'll take a 6'2 302 pound DT over a 6'3 235 QB.

Tigers roll, 31 to no more than 14.