ESPN published an early lookahead to the 2026 college football season, with ESPN reporters weighing in on the games, players and teams they’re most excited to see next fall.

As for early season games, ESPN’s David Hale pegged Clemson’s Week 1 showdown against LSU as the early season game he’s most excited to see.

Clemson and LSU are set to square off on Sept. 5 at Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge, La.

It will mark Clemson’s first trip to Baton Rouge and Clemson’s first time opening a season in an SEC venue since opening its 2016 national championship season with a 19-13 win at Auburn. It will also be Lane Kiffin’s first game as LSU’s head coach after he was hired this past November to replace Brian Kelly, who was fired in October.

“This game has the feeling of two ships passing in opposite directions,” Hale wrote. “On one side, there’s LSU, awash in hope after snagging Lane Kiffin to helm the program. The Bayou Bengals have loaded up on talent in both the portal and the recruiting trail, and Kiffin has injected an air of optimism that exceeds even what came with Brian Kelly’s arrival four years ago. For Clemson, the opposite is true. Dabo Swinney is coming off his worst season since 2010, with a question mark at QB and a host of NFL talent now off to the NFL.”

Clemson and LSU faced one another at neutral sites in postseason play four times before the two sets of Tigers met in Clemson in the 2025 season opener for their first regular season, on-campus meeting in series history – what was a highly anticipated matchup that saw LSU win, 17-10, at Memorial Stadium.

“A year ago, this game was marked as a top-five matchup with the winner a likely title contender,” Hale added. “LSU didn’t live up to that hype, and it cost Kelly his job. Clemson lost last year, and the wheels came off after that. A win in this game could turn the wariness of Clemson fans on its head and make 2026 the year Swinney revived the program — or it could be the year it all came to a crashing halt.”

Clemson concluded the 2025 campaign with a 7-6 record, capped off by a 22-10 loss to Penn State in the Pinstripe Bowl, while LSU went 7-6 as well and finished the year with a 38-35 loss to Houston in the Texas Bowl.

LSU leads the all-time series against Clemson 4-1, with Clemson’s lone win being a dramatic 25-24 victory in the 2012 Peach Bowl.

The early betting line for the 2026 Clemson-LSU game has Clemson as an 11.5-point underdog, according to FanDuel Sportsbook.