Florida Gators ready for Saturday Night in Death Valley

“It is a pantheon of concrete and steel,” longtime LSU PA announcer Dan Bourne’s voice will boom over the PA system in Tiger Stadium before kickoff. The video, which serves as a hype up video before the LSU Tigers take the field and first starting setting the scene for one of the greatest venues in college football before the Tigers played McNeese State in 2010.

“I wish everybody could experience this,” Jim McElwain said of playing in Tiger Stadium at night. “It’s something that’s beyond words.”

“A Louisiana gumbo of humanity,” Bourne continues in the video.

For opposing teams, the experience begins before they even enter the stadium. LSU fans have a special way of greeting their opponents, lining the street where the visiting teams buses travel to get into the stadium. They throw things, wave signs and have even pushed buses, rocking them back and forth, the Louisiana gumbo of humanity providing the early spice to what they hope will be a long night for the players in the bus that is now rocking from side to side.

“It’s a one-road in deal,” McElwain recalled of visiting Tiger Stadium when he was the offensive coordinator at Alabama. “Where you take the bus and for whatever the reason the local bus company drives really slow down that ramp and just the people just supporting their Tigers. I don’t know, guys this is cool.”

According to LSU’s media guide, the Tiger have only lost two home games when kickoff occurs “after the sun has found its home in the Western sky.” One of those games was in 2009, when Florida handed LSU a 13-3 defeat. The other came from Alabama, with McElwain calling plays in 2008. McElwain has experienced just what it takes to walk into the stadium that Les Miles claims, “This is Death Valley, truly a place where opponents’ dreams come to die.” He’s done it, and the school he now leads has done it too. He’s not intimidated by the 500-pound Tiger named Mike that is conveniently placed near the entrance to the visitors locker room and he doesn’t expect his players to be either.

“It’s a night game. We’ve played night games. We practiced at night. We do that,” he joked. “And so um I gotta pretty good idea we’ll show up. We’ll be there. And we will run out of the tunnel or walk out of the tunnel. We’ll get out of the tunnel. I’ll pull them and we’ll go in there and play this ballgame.”

McElwain won’t need to pull or drag his team out of the tunnel. The Florida Gators are 6-0, they’re dripping with the kind of swag that hasn’t been in Gainesville since 2006-08.

They heard the collective laugh before the season when Jim McElwain said his football team would have 15 opportunities to play football this season. Nobody’s laughing about that now.

Despite the week of distractions surrounding the Florida Gators this game was never about Will Grier’s throwing ability. Treon Harris isn’t tasked with tackling the best player in the country in Leonard Fournette either. This is a matchup of two teams who belong playing in a pantheon of concrete and steel. They don’t like each other and they’re not afraid to talk about that disdain either.

“We have a little bit of animosity built up with the DBU thing. We feel like we’re DBU, they feel like they’re DBU,” sophomore cornerback Jalen Tabor said. “We circled this game before the season. I’m pretty sure they circled the same game. They’re undefeated, we’re undefeated. Big time SEC matchup.”

This game will be hard fought, punishing, dirty; everything a matchup with two of the best in the SEC should be. It will be at night, in Death Valley, the place where opponents dreams have gone to die, Florida hopes to return the favor, let their defense do the talking and bury the Tigers’ dreams this Saturday.

“Without a doubt, best defense in the country against the best player in the country,“ Tabor said. “I would say that.”