1. Nick Saban clearly outcoached Les Miles, his team came ready to play.
2. Alabama's defense used and abused LSU's O-line all night. LSU is a run first offense, with Alabama shutting that down they essentially took LSU out of their comfort zone.
3. Alabama's offense was dominating LSU's, including Alabama exposing Mathieu(the heart and soul of the team).
Bottomline, LSU's offense wasn't spectacular all season. They just used their tough, physical run game, dominating defense, and special teams to wear a team down until their players started to get tired. Once that happened,their RBs would gash the opposing defense. Arkansas and Georgia showed some weaknesses in LSU's team, but made too mistakes in the game, and eventually ran out of gas. Georgia shut LSU down in that 1st half of the SEC Championship game, but didn't have the depth to keep it up. One special teams play, and it was over. LSU's usual gameplan wasn't going to work against Alabama who could match them with power and depth.