Four current LSU players have played there.
Anything Foster Moreau knows about playing at Florida is second-hand.
He’s never been there.
LSU (3-2,0-1 SEC) will travel to Gainesville for the first time since 2014 for a 2:30 p.m. Saturday kickoff, and LSU has only four players on the current team who saw action in the 30-27 victory that ended with a last-seconds field goal.
“I’m sure it’s loud, I’m sure it’s hot,” Moreau said. “I’ve heard stories from different guys but I’ve never been there.”
The unusually long gap between visits to Gainesville came as a result of last season’s move of the game from Florida to Baton Rogue after a Hurricane Matthew caused an initial postponement.
As a result, LSU will play this season and next at The Swamp before the Gators (3-1,3-0) come back to Baton Rouge in 2019. Florida won the rescheduled game last season 16-10 by stopping Derrius Guice just shy of the goal line on a fourth-and-goal run from the 1.
LSU missed other scoring chances with a fumble inside the red zone in the first half and a mishandled snap on a field goal from the Florida 10.
“We were in the red zone what was it five or six times and we only put it in twice,” center Will Clapp said about the game last season. “We just got to capitalize on opportunities, can’t turn the ball over. The biggest thing against Florida is you know it’s going to be a dog fight the whole game, you got to be ready for it.”
Florida selected the game for its homecoming, which added a bit of juice to the already-strong rivalry, offensive lineman K. J. Malone said.
“This game is bigger,” he said.
Malone did not play in the 2014 contest but did stand on the sideline as part of the travel squad, giving him a sense of the loud and muggy environs.
“The student section is literally as close as the banner is behind me,” Malone said Tuesday while seated a few feet in front of a purple LSU backdrop. “And just that environment, it’s a fun place to play because it’s historic and all that type of stuff. I can’t wait to go.”
The four current LSU players who saw action in 2014 were running back Darrel Williams, tight end/F-back J. D. Moore, defensive end Christian LaCouture and safety Ed Paris.
Of the players who did see action that night, 15 LSU starters and 24 LSU players overall are now in the NFL, according to the school.
LSU went into that game with an 0-2 SEC record. After beating Florida, LSU blew out Kentucky, ground out a home win against No. 3 Ole Miss and took Alabama to overtime to show some resolve after a rough start to the season.
This trip comes with LSU having lost two of the last three games in historic fashion, first a 30-point loss to Mississippi State that ranked as the worst LSU defeat in 111 games between the school, and then loss to Troy that stopped a non-conference home win streak at 49 games.
The last time an unranked LSU team played at Florida with the Gators ranked by the Associated Press, No. 12 Florida won 41-9. That was 2000, Nick Saban’s first season. LSU has lost the last six times when unranked and playing against an AP-ranked Florida team, with the other five meetings coming in succession from 1990 to 1994.
An unranked LSU team last beat an AP-ranked Florida team in 1982, a 24-13 victory against the No. 4 Gators.
An LSU win this weekend would not be as large of an upset in terms of poll placement, but it’s one that would be much-needed for a team that held a series of meetings between players, coaches and the athletic director.
“Against Florida, that’s what we all look forward to every year,” Clapp said. “It’s a good rivalry. I personally enjoy playing this game.”
