LSU is still preparing to play Arkansas Saturday morning, Tigers head coach Ed Orgeron said Thursday night.
Orgeron was asked about the the game’s status after Razorbacks coach Sam Pittman told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette Thursday that his team is “running thin” on available players.
Orgeron said he hadn’t heard Pittman’s comments and said that LSU was still planning to travel to Arkansas for the 11 a.m. kickoff.
“It’s a fluid situation,” the said. “We gotta deal with it. Look I’ve been in that situation two weeks ago. We wanted to play Alabama. We were way under the mark. It would’ve been dangerous for our team to play and according to the rules we couldn’t play.
“If they can’t and it’s under the mark, I understand it’s a fluid situation. But we want to play and we’re ready to go.”
The SEC requires teams to have at least 53 scholarship players available on game day.
The matchup will be the first game LSU’s played in almost three weeks as COVID-19 cases and quarantining due to contact tracing left LSU without enough players to host Alabama this past Saturday.
If LSU is able to play, freshman quarterback TJ Finley is likely to start for the Tigers.
“We haven’t made the final decision yet,” Oregon said. ”But it’s looking like he’s going to start although Max had a great two minute today we have a plan for max we have some different plays that Max can run. And different plays that TJ can run. We’ll talk about it tomorrow but it looks like it’s going to be TJ.”
