LSU vs. Arkansas point spread: Picking Tigers vs. Razorbacks

Arkansas and LSU are set to meet on Saturday in “Battle for the Boot” rivalry game, and it’s not expected to be close. The No. 12 Tigers (2-1, 1-0 SEC) are coming off of a 41-14 throttling of Mississippi State and currently sit as a 17.5-point favorite over the Razorbacks according to FanDuel.

That is certainly a steep number to reach, but Kayce Smith of Barstool Sports believes LSU has what it takes to cover. Speaking with On3‘s Andy Staples, she based her prediction on not only the dominant performance from the Tigers, but how out of sorts Arkansas looked as it lost 38-31 to BYU in Week 3.

“Last week, I talked myself into Arkansas -8 against BYU,” she said. “I said ‘Arkansas took care of business against BYU last year. KJ Jefferson is supposed to have taken the next step. I think that sometimes we don’t give Sam Pittman enough credit for kind of digging Arkansas out of that gross pit that they were in.’ And they proved me wrong. So I’m not taking Arkansas any more.

“I did take LSU against Mississippi State and I did feel very confident about that. Not because of Mississippi State, but because I thought that LSU was gonna figure out what the hell went wrong. You want to talk about transitive properties on the field, I’m doing it with my betting. Because Arkansas made me mad last week and played horribly against BYU and LSU took care of business, I’m taking the -17.5.”

If LSU is able win by more than the 17.5-point prediction from Vegas, it would go against the recent trend for this game. Four of the past five contests have been decided by a touchdown or less, and each of the past three were won by only a field goal. Interestingly enough, the away team has won all three of those times.

Staples looked back at last year’s contest, which the Tigers won 13-10 in a defensive battle. He noted how dominant they were in giving up just 249 yards to the Razorbacks, saying he also likes LSU to cover the spread here.

“”Defensively, they shut down Arkansas last year,” he said. “That game was really ugly, though, because Arkansas did not let LSU score. It was really weird to watch. But I think LSU should be fine offensively. It feels like they’re hitting a groove now. So I’ll take LSU to cover that gigantic number. Plus, it’s at home. LSU, the only game they played at home so far is Grambling, so they haven’t really gotten a chance to play an opponent of note with that crowd behind them.

“They still feel like they have something to prove after what happened against Florida State because they did get dominated the second half of that game, but they are a talented team. They are a team that, playing at full throttle, should be able to beat anybody in the country.”

Whether LSU quarterback Jayden Daniels can carry over his performance from Week 3 will also be a key factor. He looked like one of the best players in the country in completing a school record 88.2% of his passes for 364 yards and two touchdowns. He also led the Tigers with 64 yards rushing and a pair of scores on the ground.

However, Smith noted that Daniels at times was inconsistent last season, including in the game against the Razorbacks. He went just 8-of-15 passing for 86 yards and an interception and was limited to 10 yards rushing on 19 carries (0.5 yards per carry).

The Tigers will hope last week’s version of Daniels shows up on Saturday as he aims to bounce back from that 2022 performance.

“Nobody expected Jayden Daniels to do what he did last week either,” Smith said. “I expected them to win and to cover, but he had a historically good day breaking records at LSU and all of that. We saw some games last year where he looked incredible and then they go out and have games where they lose to an A&M team that they had no business losing to at the end of the season.

“If Jayden Daniels looks even 75% of the way he did last week this week, they’ll be fine. If he looks the exact same way, it’s a blowout from the beginning.”

Arkansas and LSU are set to kick off at 6 p.m. CT on Saturday in Baton Rouge.