Since Nick Saban arrived in Tuscaloosa for the 2007 season, Alabama vs. LSU has been one of the premier rivalries in college football. It is annually one of the biggest regular-season games in the country, and during the days of the SEC's divisional system, the SEC West was normally decided on a fall Saturday in November when the Tide and Tigers met.
Alabama is 14-4 against LSU since 2008, but just because the overall results have been lopsided doesn't mean each game has. There's been a ton of classics in there. Typically, the point spread between the two is a touchdown or less.
That's where the spread was trending most of the summer. Early betting lines had the game handicapped with Alabama as a 5-7 point favorite, depending on where you looked. Both teams were preseason Top 10 and expected to compete for not only a berth in the College Football Playoff, but for the National Championship.
Alabama has held up its end of the bargain, arriving to next weekend's matchup winners of seven straight and No. 4 in the polls. LSU, on the other hand, has already suffered three losses, the latest of which was a beatdown at home by the hands of Texas A&M that proved to be the final straw for Brian Kelly in Baton Rouge.
Kelly was fired on Sunday, meaning Alabama will face an interim head coach next weekend in Tuscaloosa when LSU comes to town.
As a result of major dysfunction and in the wake of Kelly's termination, Alabama has been installed as a significant favorite over a talented Tigers team.
Alabama is a 12.5-point favorite LSU
FanDuel re-released an early betting line for next Saturday's tilt, and Alabama is now a 12.5-point home favorite over LSU.
It's the largest point spread in the series since the Crimson Tide was a four-touchdown favorite over the Tigers in 2021 at home. That proved to be far too high, as Alabama survived a scare against a mediocre LSU team 20-14 in Bryant-Denny.
Coming off a bye week for both teams, Kalen DeBoer needs to have his team prepared for a similar level of fight from LSU that the 2021 team saw, despite being heavy favorites. You often see teams rally together after a coach's firing, especially when said coach was as unpopular as Kelly has proven to be.
Alabama finds itself in a great spot in its second and final bye week of the regular season. The comeback win over South Carolina allowed DeBoer and his team to maintain an additional mulligan that would have been used up otherwise.
With due respect to Eastern Illinois, Alabama has three games remaining against teams that can beat them. If the Tide can navigate that stretch at 2-1, then it will not only clinch a spot in the College Football Playoff, it would almost certainly find itself in Atlanta for the SEC Championship Game, too.