Brian Kelly confirms Denver Harris is available for LSU

LSU cornerback Denver Harris didn’t play against Florida State in the season opener, leading coach Brian Kelly to field questions about his availability going forward.

Kelly fielded such a question on an SEC teleconference call on Wednesday and cleared up Harris’ status for this week’s game against Grambling State.

“Yes, he is available,” Kelly said. “He is available.”

Harris is a former highly touted recruit who transferred to LSU after spending his freshman season at Texas A&M in 2022. Harris appeared in five games and managed 14 tackles and three pass breakups for the Aggies.

Harris missed some time during fall camp for what Kelly had called “personal matters,” but he had returned to camp by mid-August.

The Bengal Tiger’s Shea Dixon had opened up on Harris’ status at the time on the Andy Staples On3 show, highlighting some of the potential issues at play.

“We’ve gotten to see Denver Harris out there, and he started out the first week, running second team,” Dixon told On3’s Andy Staples. “And it kind of felt like okay, they’re dangling the carrot and they’re motivating him and they want him to take charge.

“Well, in very short order, he was third team and with guys who were walk-ons and in a room where you already lost one of your transfers, JK Johnson, to injury during fall camp. Now, you’re down to two transfers in Duce Chestnut and Zy Alexander. Those two get every first-team rep, and now Denver’s third team? We just saw things in practice with the media being there of kind of piping back at the coaches or whatever it might be to where you’re like, ‘Oh man, this isn’t what you normally see and you’re not seeing that from anywhere else.’”

Maason Smith to return from suspension

While Harris will be available, so too will defensive tackle Maason Smith, who had to sit out against Florida State for receiving impermissible benefits as a result of an autograph signing.

Kelly explained how LSU will work Smith back into the mix after he missed almost the entire 2022 season due to injury.

“I think that we have the be realistic,” Kelly said. “When you haven’t played in over a year, he’s not going to be able to play the duration of the game. If we can get somewhere near 30 snaps, we’d be really excited about that. Again, he’s practicing for us but it’s going to take a little bit of time. Hopefully, we can get somewhere in that range of quality snaps from him and give him the chance to impact the game.”

LSU and Grambling State are set to meet at 7:30 p.m. ET on Saturday night in Baton Rouge, La.