Brian Kelly was as demonstrative as one would expect from a coach after LSU’s 27-20 loss to USC on Sunday in Las Vegas.

In the postgame press conference, Kelly told reporters he was angry at his football team for the first time in his three years in charge, at one point pounding the podium in frustration and raising his voice about penalties.

“We’re sitting here talking about the same things again,” Kelly said. “About not finishing when you have an opponent that is capable of shutting them down. But what we’re doing on the sidelines is we feel like the game is over. And I’m so angry about that that I have to do something about it. I’m not doing a good enough job as a coach.”

“It’s unacceptable that we didn’t find a way to win this game. That’s ridiculous. That’s crazy.”

Kelly said LSU didn’t play complementary football. When the offense was running, he felt the defense let up. When the defense stopped USC on fourth down midway through the fourth quarter, the offense went 3-and-out and gave the ball right back to the Trojans, who marched down the field, scored a touchdown and took over the momentum.

“But what concerns me most are the personal fouls,” he said. “The penalties that are selfish. Both of them resulted in points and they are undisciplined penalties. Ultimately, they come back to me. We pride ourselves on running a disciplined program, but we clearly didn’t do a good enough job there. That affected the game.”

On the fourth down stop, LSU defensive back Major Burns received a penalty for removing his helmet on the field, causing LSU to lose 15 yards early in the possession.

After USC took a 20-17 lead, LSU got off to a bad start – 1 of 3 fumbles were attributed to the LSU offensive line in the game.

LSU was penalized twice for pass interference. Jardin Gilbert was also penalized for targeting a pass on a USC pass that turned a 20-yard pass into a 34-yard gain, putting the Trojans at the LSU 13-yard line with 8 seconds left.

“Ten (penalties) is too many,” Kelly said. “But two personal fouls leading to goals is unacceptable.”

When the Tigers go back and watch the tape, they will feel like they missed a game in which they did enough to win.

Kelly felt the Tigers were complacent after taking a 17-13 lead late in the third quarter. He said LSU’s offensive weakness, attacks reaching the end zone, put too much pressure on the defense to be “something they’re not prepared to do.” He said LSU “doesn’t know how to handle ourselves” when we take the lead in games, and that’s clear after the Week 1 loss.