Just when LSU’s offense seemed to be soaring toward the stratosphere, the whole contraption malfunctioned during a surprisingly frustrating afternoon last week at Arkansas.

The Tigers won the game, of course, mostly a credit to their defense that stuffed the Razorbacks enough for one LSU touchdown to hold up in a 13-10 victory that clinched the Southeastern Conference West Division title.

But in clinching a berth in the Dec. 3 conference title game against Georgia (10-0, 7-0 SEC) in Atlanta, it was still a humbling game for an offense that had been on an upwardly fast-tracked trajectory through the three previous victories.

“So there’s a lot to work on,” said LSU head coach Brian Kelly said, who’ll have this week’s nonconference game against Alabama-Birmingham (5-5) and next week’s at Texas A&M (3-7, 1-6) before its shot against Georgia’s nationally top-ranked defense.

Where to start?

The Tigers (8-2, 6-1) did manage 200 yards rushing, but maybe it only confirmed the suspicion that the LSU attack goes only as far as quarterback Jayden Daniels and his dual-threat mischief can take it.

Arkansas’ obvious plan was not to let Daniels beat them either by land or air.

Daniels, who normally leads the Tigers in rushing, was sacked seven times and managed 10 net yards on the ground while completing 8 of 15 passes for a mere 86 yards in the air.

It left the Tigers, who’d cracked 30 points in their three previous SEC games, 154 total yards shy of their season average.

It was also 157 fewer yards and 18 fewer points than Arkansas normally allows.

“A lot of this will be about our improvement, our preparation, how … we’ll be a better football team. That will be our focus,” Kelly said.

The passing struggles came against a Razorbacks secondary that ranked next to last in the SEC going into the game at just over 300 yards per game.

“Yeah, we were defended quite well,” Kelly said in giving credit to the Razorbacks. “So I think part of this is understanding the adjustments we have to make when teams are looking to defend things that have been really good for us. We’ve got to make some adjustments.

‘”We’ve got to look at how we’re doing things and be one step ahead from that perspective and have some adjustments, do some things that allow us to be effective at we’re good at.”

Much was made of Arkansas’ use of a three-man defensive front, but Kelly said the Tigers have probably faced more of that alignment than any other this season.

“What was different was their edges (rushers) were a little bit more aggressive,” he said. “We just simply didn’t take advantage of their aggressiveness.

“I think that falls on me. We’ve got to prepare our team to be more aggressive against that want to play three down with the edges being so close. We have talented players on the perimeter and we’ve got to get the ball out to them. That’s the answer.”

The seven sacks particularly stood out for a young offensive line whose improvement despite two true freshmen starting at the tackles, had been viewed as a key to the offensive turnaround.

But Kelly said there are a lot more pieces to it than the offensive line when judging pass protection.

“We have to prepare for those kinds of situations where defenses say we’re just going to give you everything we’ve got, and what do we have to lose?” he said. “It falls on me and our offensive staff to prepare for those kinds of situations, and be prepared, so it won’t happen again.”