Florida schedules LSU for 2017 homecoming game because of course it did

Football

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As discussed at length, the Florida Gators football team and athletic program owned the LSU Tigers in 2016. Looking to keep that momentum going, Florida has chosen its 2017 game against LSU as homecoming weekend for the university.

The Gators and Tigers will do battle on Saturday, Oct. 7, making it the first time in a decade that Florida will host LSU on homecoming. The prior two such meetings, in 1996 and 2006, were victories for UF on the way to eventual national championships.

Florida will host LSU in consecutive seasons for the first time in series history after the 2016 game between the teams was moved to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, later in the season as a result of Hurricane Matthew. It marked the first time the Gators and Tigers played in the month of November.

UF took down LSU 16-10 on a fourth-down goal-line stop to stop a touchdown with no time remaining, earning a measure of revenge after Tigers’ fans called the Gators scared for being concerned about a natural disaster and LSU administration attempted to strong-arm the Southeastern Conference into an extra home game without compensation for Florida.

As it turns out, the Gators dominated the Tigers in the 2016-17 athletic season, earning a 10-3 record over their cross-division rivals. Florida concluded the season with baseball sweeping LSU in the College World Series Championship Series to win the program’s first national championship. Fans naturally want UF to present rings to that team at halftime of the LSU football game this fall.

Ultimately though, the Gators have put themselves in a tough spot by putting homecoming on a week with such a difficult opponent as the Tigers. Florida is 67-24-2 all-time on homecoming, 25-3 since 1989 because most of those games have been against somewhat lesser competition.