Common goal

• By RANDY ROSETTA
• Advocate sportswriter
• Published: Aug 10, 2009

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Almost two years after the fact, most football games are a blur to coaches whose lives revolve around game plans and figuring out ways to outfox a counterpart across the field.

But LSU coordinators Gary Crowton and John Chavis didn’t seem to have any problems with recall Sunday when asked about the last time they coached against one another.

The Tigers offensive and defensive coordinators took their turn at the microphone fielding questions after LSU coach Les Miles as part of media day at the McClendon Football Complex. The coaches and LSU players followed that with a Fan Day at the River Center as the team took a day off after three days of fall camp.

Crowton and Chavis are on the same staff now, but in 2007 they matched wits in a showdown of two of the most respected coordinators in college football when LSU and Tennessee tangled in the SEC Championship game at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta.

The Tigers prevailed that day 21-14, scratching out a tough-as-nails victory when Jonathan Zenon returned an interception and raced 18 yards for the go-ahead touchdown with 9:54 left on the clock.

Fitting that a defensive touchdown made the difference, because Chavis’ gritty Volunteers defense bent but didn’t break much against Crowton’s offense much of the night, with sophomore quarterback Ryan Perrilloux at the controls of the Tigers.

LSU moved the ball effectively, racking up 464 yards on 80 plays with 21 first downs. But the Volunteers wouldn’t budge when the Tigers threatened to score.

Besides Zenon’s pick-six, LSU generated only one offensive touchdown, a 27-yard Perrilloux strike to Demetrius Byrd. The Vols held the Tigers to a pair of field goals in the first half and Colt David also missed a 30-yarder.

Shutting down the LSU offense hasn’t happened much since Crowton arrived.

In the 12 games before the ’07 championship game and the 14 since, the Tigers have had only one similar performance.

On Nov. 22, the Ole Miss defense limited LSU to 13 points (one touchdown) and 215 total yards, the low-water mark in Crowton’s two seasons.

In 27 games with Crowton drawing up his multi-layer offense, LSU has averaged 34.9 points a game. That day in Atlanta, Chavis won a lot of the battles, even though the Tigers and Crowton won the war.

“In the championship game against Tennessee, his defense fought hard,” Crowton said, emphasizing the final word of his sentence.