COLLEGE STATION, Texas — Garrett Nussmeier has made his mark on this season's LSU football team.

He's led fourth quarter and overtime comebacks to win meaningful games. The LSU quarterback has carved up defenses at times, making it look more like a video game than real football.

But as things gradually snowballed for the Tigers in their 38-23 loss to Texas A&M Saturday night at Kyle Field, Nussmeier was ultimately planted in a lose-lose situation.

LSU (6-2, 3-1 SEC), which dropped its first Southeastern Conference game of the season at A&M, could not establish a run game with an active pulse against a quality Aggie defense and defensive front. Special teams had its worst game of the season by far and the missed field goals from Damian Ramos washed out once promising drives that quickly became duds.

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Texas A&M switched quarterbacks from Conner Weigman to the freshman Marcel Reed early in the third quarter and LSU's defense was not prepared for the zone quarterback read run plays.

Simply, Nussmeier, the LSU offense, which had to play the second half without starting senior left guard Garrett Dellinger who suffered a lower leg injury in the first half and did not return, and the Tigers' defense and special teams didn't have the answers.

To Brian Kelly, that falls on coaching.

"I feel as though from a coaching standpoint, we need to help our team," Kelly said after the loss Saturday night. "I feel like we didn't have the answers necessary on defense nor on offense. We need to coach better and execute better in the second half. It's disappointing that we did not."

Nussmeier came into the matchup with Texas A&M (7-1, 5-0) having thrown just six picks through seven games. He tossed three against the Aggies, all coming in the second half and all led to A&M touchdowns.

"That's a tough one," Nussmeier said. "Things didn't go our way. I've got to execute better and I've got to do a better job of taking care of the football.

"It's a terrible feeling right now."

But it wasn't just the interceptions. Kelly expressed disappointment in the offense's inability to get anything going on offense.

"I know (LSU offensive line coach) Brad Davis is disappointed. I know (LSU offensive coordinator Joe Sloan) is disappointed. I know (running backs coach Frank Wilson) is disappointed," Kelly said. "We've spent a lot of time on our run game. We thought we had made the progress necessary against a good front in Arkansas but we just didn't come to fruition tonight.

"We did not get the kind of production that would keep a Garrett Nussmeier from having to stand on his freaking head at the quarterback position and making plays. He feels like he has to."

For the second time this season, the field goal unit's timing was off and an early snap resulted in another turnover. Before that miscue, Ramos missed two field goals that would've helped pad LSU's lead in the first half.

"The silliness of the field goal stuff, that has got to end. That is just ridiculous," Kelly said. "We'll clean that up in short order. That's happened twice now and it's unacceptable. We're going to get it fixed and it's never going to happen again."

As Reed galloped for three scores in the second half, the Tigers' defense looked like it wasn't prepared for him to play, although he has seen action in a few games this season. Kelly said that LSU has a plan for the running quarterback but it wasn't executed to a level they needed.

LSU senior linebacker Greg Penn told reporters postgame that the unit was caught off guard by Reed and that they had not prepared for that style of offense.

"We didn't really prepare for it honestly," Penn said. "We didn't think that he was going to come into the game. Him coming into the game kind of caught us off guard. We didn't really know what runs they were going to run. Them doing that opened the game up for them.

"(Making in-game adjustments for two different styles of quarterback) is very hard, especially for it to happen in the second half like that. You don't have time to make adjustments. It's tough to do when it happens in the third quarter. I'm not making any excuses but it's definitely a challenge."

LSU's loss at A&M was a microcosm of nothing coming together. Several old issues the Tigers battled, like defenders trying to handle more than their sole responsibility within the scheme, lack of consistency in the run game and run-game blocking up front, all reared their heads once again.

There's still plenty for LSU to play for but what upended it at Kyle Field could haunt the Tigers in games coming.

"Right now, I'd run the quarterback against us," Kelly said.

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Cory Diaz covers the LSU Tigers for The Daily Advertiser as part of the USA TODAY Network. Follow his Tigers coverage on Twitter: @ByCoryDiaz. Got questions regarding LSU athletics? Send them to Cory Diaz at bdiaz@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Daily Advertiser: LSU football fell apart in Texas A&M. Here's why.