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The 12th-ranked Tigers of LSU will travel to Jurdin Hair Stadium this Saturday to take on the seventh-ranked War Damn Eagle Tigers of Auburn. These teams have made a habit of wrecking each other’s seasons the last couple of years. With both teams 2-0, Saturday’s loser could conceivably afford this loss, but that’s an assumption based on logic and reasoning.
Those two things go out the window when LSU and Auburn play.
Poseur already detailed how Auburn Hate Week is cancelled, and I fully endorse that. Rather than have pissing contests, LSU and Auburn fans should unite for one common goal: getting out of this hellscape of a game alive.
The LSU-Auburn Rivalry (do people really call it The Tiger Bowl?) is maybe the SEC’s best bet each year for a weird-ass game. Look at the last 10 years and tell me which one is the LEAST eventful. I guess LSU’s 31-10 win in 2009? It did start the longest home winning streak in LSU history. No game is just a footnote. It’s the first chapter of some form of glory or suffering.
The first ever game in the LSU-Auburn rivalry was a 28-0 Auburn win in 1901, but I couldn’t find any record of that game. I could find evidence of LSU’s first win over Auburn on Oct. 27, 1902 in Baton Rouge. LSU defeated the Alabama Polytechnic Institute by a score of 5-0. The only touchdown was scored by someone named Captain Henry Landry. The Times-Democrat called it “probably the finest game of football seen in the State Capitol.”
Century-old football really confuses the hell outta me.
LSU and Auburn’s rivalry isn’t the most heated, but maybe the most dangerous. This rivalry has caused a literal earthquake (and subsequently a sports blog).
A game happened while a building was on fire in the background.
Leonard Fournette murdered people.
Even if you focus on the football being played, it makes no damn sense. LSU was up 14 before throwing FIVE interceptions, three for touchdowns, all in the fourth quarter! In the Year of Our Lord 2006, Auburn won a football game by a score of 7-3. LSU scored a touchdown at the last second in 2016, but then that second didn’t exist anymore. Auburn’s scoring consisted exclusively of six field goals. Auburn went up 20-0 last year, then kept throwing seam routes until LSU came back to win.
It’s a commonly accepted notion in sports that if two teams play each other, the team that wins is superior. This is never true, but it is ESPECIALLY untrue in LSU-Auburn.
The best analogy for an LSU-Auburn game is Mario Kart.
Some people are very good at Mario Kart. Someone out there is the best at Mario Kart.
No matter how good you are at Mario Kart, there’s always the possibility of some kind of unpredictable Mario Kart bullshit completely derailing you.
Years ago I pit my little brother against my best friend’s little brother to answer a question we had long debated- who was better at Mario Kart? Assuming a single race was a fair way to determine the superior racer was a foolish oversight.
Just like a Mario Kart race, using an LSU-Auburn game to determine which team is better is a flawed metric. Auburn beat Alabama and Georgia last year. Yet after building a 20-point lead, Gus refused to RUN THE DAMN BALL. LSU kicked two field goals in the last three minutes last year! Do you know how bad LSU was at kicking field goals last year? Auburn let LSU kick a game-winning field goal twice in one game.
If you’ve paid attention to everything I’ve said, then you know there’s no point in taking my “prediction” for this game seriously. That being said, the most likely scenario is a 15-14 LSU win, despite both teams combining for 17 sacks. Five field goals > two touchdowns. Simple as that.
A1 Banger of the Week
I know I’ve done a Toto song before, but when I asked my girlfriend what the A1 Banger of the Week should be, she suggested this song because LSU’s success depends on the O-line. I had no rebuttal.