Smoke rising behind Tiger Stadium was the last thing LSU needed before its showdown with Texas. Lane Kiffin’s Tigers were already backed into a corner after Alabama handed them a brutal 31-13 loss. At 6-3, LSU couldn’t afford another collapse without watching its playoff hopes go up in smoke. And with No. 6 Texas rolling into Baton Rouge, the pressure was about to get a whole lot uglier.

According to an X post by The Advocate’s Jon Blau, the fire was on the bridge behind Tiger Stadium. Fire near Tiger Stadium has happened before. On August 20, 2006, a fire started inside Gate 3 and was out in about 20 minutes.

LSU said investigators later arrested a juvenile for simple arson. The stadium took minimal damage. With nothing reported other than a fire behind the stadium and little information about any injuries, the game went on Saturday.

With kickoff set for 6:30 p.m. CT, neither team was in great shape. Texas is 7-2 overall and 4-2 in the SEC, with four wins over ranked teams. LSU is 6-3 and 3-3 in conference play and needs to win this matchup if it wants to stay in the playoff race.

Texas beat Ohio State 24-23 and Tennessee 20-17, then lost back-to-back games to Oklahoma and Florida by the same 27-24 score. It has since won three straight, including a 34-20 victory at Missouri. LSU lost 32-24 at Ole Miss, 35-34 at Kentucky, and then to Alabama.

The Longhorns also had a rough Friday. A nationwide FAA ground stop delayed their flight about seven hours, and they didn’t reach the team hotel until after midnight. Kiffin had little patience for self-pity after the Alabama loss.

“It is where we are, and we can’t change that. We have to go back to work. We’ve got no time to sit around and feel bad,” Kiffin said on Saturday after the loss to Alabama, according to Cole Shelton of Lindy’s Sports. “We’ve got what I assume is a top-10 team coming in here in Texas. That’s probably the one good thing about playing these types of teams in a row. You’ve got a chance to play another national game and get back on track.”

Texas leads the all-time series 9-8-1 but hasn’t played in Baton Rouge since 1953. The last meeting came in Austin in 2019, when LSU won 45-38. Texas last beat the Tigers in 2003, and now Arch Manning, who grew up in New Orleans, came home to play in front of 100,000 people who weren’t on his side.

LSU’s red-zone problem is the real issue

The bigger issue for LSU is what happens inside the 20. Against Alabama, the Tigers gained 457 yards but scored one touchdown on four red-zone trips. They also went 0-for-4 on fourth down.

“That’s really been our number one problem offensively [red-zone execution]. We’ve got all kinds of yards,” Kiffin said. “If you look at the SEC games alone, we have 10 drives inside the ten that we did not score touchdowns. That’s 70 more points out of those drives if you’re scoring touchdowns. And five of those drives, we score no points at all.”

For the Tigers, if that doesn’t get fixed, nothing else matters. Quarterback Sam Leavitt has thrown for 2,553 yards and 17 touchdowns, and Jackson Harris has 800 receiving yards. With the Tigers facing Texas, which has allowed just nine touchdowns on 23 opponent trips inside its 20, LSU has to finish drives.