Southwest Airlines adds special flight for fans attending USC vs. LSU game

In a surprising turn of events, a major airline just made life a whole lot easier on college football fans who wish to travel to their team’s marquee non-conference game this fall.

As per usual, the college football season kicks off with a slew of premier non-conference matchups, several of which occur on neutral fields. One of those contests is SEC powerhouse LSU vs. new Big Ten contender USC out in Las Vegas at Allegiant Stadium. That’s also one of the games to get a special flight package from Southwest Airlines.

On their official website, Southwest recently announced the opportunity to purchase a direct flight to and from Las Vegas out of New Orleans, Louisiana.

“Thinking about following your favorite college football team on the road this season? Southwest just made it easier for you with extra flights to see six marquee matchups in September and October,” read the post on Southwest’s website.

“On key weekends, we’ve added extra service between New Orleans and Las Vegas, Nashville and Oklahoma City, as well as Atlanta and Austin,” the post added.

Apparently, those are typical flights for Southwest Airlines, they’re just getting some more of those specific flights for that weekend. However, they’re also creating some direct flights from scratch for the other games.

“Additionally, new service kicks off between Austin and Detroit, Birmingham and Milwaukee, and Columbus and Portland, Ore.”

The official dates for the flight from New Orleans to Las Vegas would include a departure on Aug. 29 or 30, and a return trip on Sept. 2 or 3.

LSU has made a habit of playing some pretty major opponents outside of conference play. Of course, they faced Florida State each of the past two seasons and may be wishing they hadn’t after the Seminoles scored a win in 2022 thanks to a bizarre end of the game, before they then blew out the Tigers in 2023.

Going back to 2021, LSU also lost their marquee out-of-conference game on the road vs. UCLA, kick-starting a tough season that was bad enough to get a coach who just won the national title two years prior fired.

There wasn’t an opportunity to face a big-time non-conference foe in 2020, so the last LSU win against a non-SEC power conference team in the regular season came all the way back in 2019, when Joe Burrow announced to the nation his Heisman candidacy in a 45-38 shootout win at Texas.