Chick-fil-A Bowl Preview: LSU Looks to Tame the Other Tigers

The Game Formerly Known as the Peach Bowl, 7:30 p.m. ET, ESPN

It was about time that LSU and Clemson met again. The two have only played each other twice, the last time coming in 1996. Just in the last five years, the non-SEC Tigers have played Auburn three times, Alabama once, Kentucky once and South Carolina every season. Everyone should get to play Clemson and hate them every once in a while.

Clemson hasn't had much luck at this so far. The Purple Tigers are 4-6 against the SEC in their last ten games, with one of those wins coming against this year's dreadful Auburn team. They're coming off a ten-point loss to South Carolina, which largely shut down Clemson's high-octane offense for much of the annual rivalry game.

But it is still a relatively high-octane offense. The ACC Tigers average 518.3 yards a game and have scored 40 or more points eight times this year. Sure, most of that came against ACC teams, some of which were -- we'll go with of questionable quality on defense, but more than 500 yards a game is still more than 500 yards a game. Nobody else in the ACC is doing that -- Clemson tops the conference in total and scoring offense.

Clemson also plays defense, which is a kind way of saying they don't do it particularly well. In fact, the Tigers allowed an even 411 yards of total offense per contest, which lands them at 73rd in total offense. Some of that is inflated by the high-tempo Clemson offense, which gives the other team more turns with the ball, but that also means that LSU is going to be getting the ball a few extra times tonight.

They'll need it. Even by LSU standards, the offense has been incredibly sluggish this year, generating just 387.2 yards per game, which is ninth even in the defense-minded SEC. But LSU is slightly better than South Carolina on defense, which means it should be good enough to keep the other Tigers from doing too much damage.

LSU 24, Clemson 10