Impactful coaching moves: The best and worst decisions of Week 2

While Week 1 served as a nice warm-up for most of the SEC with a 12-1 mark, the season got going in earnest in Week 2 with a trio of conference games and a top 25 non-conference clash highlighting the schedule.

LSU hopped in the SEC West driver’s seat with a 21-19 win at Mississippi State, while Georgia and Kentucky picked up SEC wins at Vanderbilt and South Carolina, respectively.

Let’s have a look at the coaching highs and lows from the week that was:

GOOD MOVE

Last season in Baton Rogue, Mississippi State’s Dak Prescott tore through the LSU defense with 105 yards on 22 carries.

In this year’s game, LSU defensive coordinator Kevin Steele made containing Prescott a priority, and the Tigers did so — holding the senior quarterback to minus-19 yards rushing in a narrow win.

Steele, and new defensive line coach Ed Orgeron, limited the Bulldogs to less than 50 yards rushing as a team, and put pressure on Prescott all night.

Well, most of it, anyway.

“We did it very well in the first half,” middle linebacker Kendell Beckwith said. “We’ve just gotta keep it up late in the game.”

BAD MOVE

There’s plenty of “bad” around Arkansas’ 16-12 home loss to Toledo, and the coaching staff deserves its share of criticism.

Bret Bielema’s commentary on Ohio State’s schedule, while true, took his team’s focus away from Toledo. It’s hard to convince college kids to take something seriously if their coach is spending time breaking down the Buckeyes’ run through the Big Ten.

In addition, offensive coordinator Dan Enos ran the offense like he was back at Central Michigan, dialing up 53 passing plays while the Razorbacks ground game sputtered to 103 yards on 31 carries.

Brandon Allen had more than 400 yards passing, but failed to throw a touchdown pass as Arkansas struggled in the red zone, as five trips inside the Toledo 20 netted a single field goal.

GOOD MOVE

Winning road games in the SEC is not easy, no matter where you happen to be.

So, Georgia deserves some credit for its workman-like win over Vanderbilt.

My colleague, John Hollis, correctly points out that there’s plenty of room for growth, but in a weekend where Auburn needed overtime to beat Jacksonville (more to come on that) and that mess I described a few paragraphs ago in Little Rock, the Bulldogs got a low drama, SEC win.

And that’s never a bad thing.

Yes, Greyson Lambert needs to be better. But as long as Nick Chubb and Sony Michel are combining for 245 yards on 31 carries, Georgia will be OK.

Credit offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer for keeping the ball on the ground and giving Lambert a chance to grow into the role. Of course, this weekend, that approach may not work quite as well against South Carolina (6 p.m. ET, SECN).

BAD MOVE

It’s hard to have an uglier win that the one Auburn had against Jacksonville State last week.

You can look in all sorts of directions. Jeremy Johnson is throwing interceptions at an alarming rate, and Will Muschamp’s defense allowed 28 first downs and 438 yards to JSU.

But I’m putting this one at the feet of Gus Malzahn.

This was the classic trap game. Facing an over-matched opponent at home, a week before a big SEC West road game at LSU, it was always going to be hard to get his players ready to play.

Sure, Jacksonville State is a top-10 team in the FCS, but it was up to him to keep his team focused on the Gamecocks, and not looking ahead to Baton Rogue.

And he’s very fortunate not to have become a national punchline.

Randy Capps

Randy Capps is a contributing writer for Saturday Down South. He covers SEC football, South Carolina and Georgia.