‘The SEC is loaded again’: Brian Kelly trying to prepare LSU

The LSU Tigers don’t have much time to lick their wounds from the season-opening loss to USC or celebrate the bounce-back win against Nicholls in Week 2.

Brian Kelly’s team has a Week 3 matchup with South Carolina, which is 2-0 and has already picked up its first in-conference win of the season thanks to a 31-6 blowout of Kentucky on the road last weekend.

The Gamecocks are dangerous, and LSU doesn’t have the luxury of looking ahead. Still, nothing is going to come easy in the SEC this season. If the Tigers can get past South Carolina, games against Ole Miss, Alabama, Oklahoma, Texas A&M, Vanderbilt and Missouri still loom large on the schedule.

“Yeah, the SEC is loaded again,” Kelly said on “The Paul Finebaum Show” on Monday (h/t On3’s Nick Kosko). “Look, I think we knew right from the very beginning that this year, more than maybe any that I can remember, that there wasn’t just one team. There are some great teams in this league. There’s no doubt. I mean, you still got to go through Georgia, but Texas has shown itself obviously now as a new member, Alabama is going to be formidable.

“But Ole Miss and what they’re doing early on, you know, Tennessee’s had a great win. This is the depth of this league. It’s (what makes) this the best league in the country, and so each week is going to be a slugfest and now look. I mean little old LSU and little old South Carolina are playing and people don’t even care about it, but these are two pretty good teams too so we’ll see what happens at the end of the day.”

Although Kelly tried to downplay the matchup between the Tigers and Gamecocks, it is worth noting that ESPN’s “College GameDay” will be live on campus in Columbia, South Carolina, for the game.