Defending national champion LSU will face Utah in a home-and-home series in 2031 and 2032, the schools announced on Monday.
LSU and Utah will play on Sept. 6, 2031, in Salt Lake City and again the following year in Tiger Stadium on Sept. 11, 2032. The two programs have played only twice in football, with LSU winning both games in the series. It will be the first meeting between the teams since 1976, when LSU won, 35-7, in Tiger Stadium. LSU also won 35-10 in 1974.
The two dates with LSU are the farthest into the future Utah has scheduled any opponents. The Utes were in the conversation this past season for the College Football Playoff but dropped out after their 37-15 loss to Oregon in the Pac-12 championship game. Utah finished No. 11 in the final CFP ranking.
"Our aspirations to continue to grow and elevate our football program make opportunities like this especially important," Utah director of athletics Mark Harlan said in a prepared statement. "For our student-athletes, it is an incredible opportunity to play a high-profile opponent in two fantastic environments. It also is incredibly attractive to our fans to host a team like LSU at Rice-Eccles Stadium and to go on the road to Baton Rouge and cheer on their Utes."
Utah now has 26 nonconference games scheduled between 2020 and 2032, including six against members of the SEC (Florida 2022-23, Arkansas 2026 and '28, LSU 2031-32), two against a Big 12 program (Baylor 2023-24) and seven against BYU (2020-21, 2024-28).
With the addition of Utah to the schedule, LSU is now scheduled to play at least one nonconference regular-season game against a Power 5 conference team for the next 13 years. This season, LSU will host Texas, followed by a game against UCLA in the Rose Bowl in 2021.
Last week, LSU announced a two-game, neutral-site series with Florida State. LSU's first game against the Seminoles is Sept. 4, 2022, in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome, and the second will be played Sept. 3, 2023, at Camping World Stadium in Orlando.